Slowly but surely is the way to diversity
I was fascinated by Aysha Afridi's beautifully written and thought-provoking article on the Diversify scheme (Museums Journal November 2005, p16-17). Is there not an element of 'trying to carry water in a sieve' about all social engineering?
I went to university at Queen Mary College in east London at the end of the 1950s. Many of my fellow students were the products of working class homes and the London grammar schools.
They went on to become university lecturers, teachers, professionals and managers of various kinds; most married and had families, and their children have grown up in middle class homes.
Afridi says many of her fellow Diversify Positive Action Trainees were from the middle class end of the spectrum and could have afforded postgraduate training.
Was this because their parents or grandparents had got their hands dirty, working hard to improve the lot of their offspring? Should such families be expected to support their children through postgraduate training as well?
Afridi also comments that Diversify trainees should not be expected to specialise in the art from their own ethnic background, but that many seem to have gone in the opposite direction. Are these the trainees who will be most valuable in the future?
Someone developing a passion for art from another culture may well combine this passion with a deep-rooted, perhaps subconscious, understanding of art from their own cultural background.
Will this do more to bring the cultures together than someone who remains steeped in their own background? After all, most of us become fascinated by our own roots and cultural background as we become older, so youth is the time to spread our wings.
Culture Secretary David Lammy at a Black History Month event at the British Museum welcomed progress in diversifying audiences but lamented lack of progress in the workforce. Does one not follow from the other?
Visits foster interest. By the time the children visiting museums today finish at university and consider a career, will Afridi and some of her Diversify colleagues hold senior posts in museums and galleries and be the role models of the future?
If Lammy can look back when he is in his 60s across 30 years of steady progress, that will surely be success worth celebrating.
Carol Bunbury, member of British Association of Friends of Museums
It was useful to hear Afridi's views and I agree with her that this sector has a problem in attracting people from non-traditional, non-middle-class backgrounds.
However, I disagree with her assertion that the Museums Association (MA) has shot itself in the foot with the Diversify scheme by employing trainees from only privileged backgrounds. Diversify isn't about class and never set out to be.
Out of the 56 people who are participating in the scheme some may well be from middle-class families, but some are not. We have never taken it upon ourselves to ask people applying to the scheme what social background they come from.
The scheme focuses on encouraging people from African, Caribbean, Asian and Chinese communities to consider training for future employment in the museum sector and we are able to do this under the terms of the Race Relations Act (1976).
It would be complex and a potential legal minefield to introduce a further set of criteria which selected people on their social background as well, and I'm sure the MA would come into criticism for this.
Diversify is not tokenistic nor a one-off; it has become sustainable, with many host museums looking creatively at their budgets in order to establish positive action training initiatives that are not reliant on central government funding.
This has to be a good thing as it is simply unacceptable that our workforce does not currently reflect the UK population. Diversify is beginning to readdress this imbalance and is doing so with considerable success.
The clear focus of the scheme is an important part of its success. The MA is very interested in wider issues of entry to the museum profession and hopes to investigate and stimulate discussion about this.
Lucy Shaw, Diversify coordinator, Museums Association
Voluntary sector offers a solution
With reference to Sharon Heal's editorial asking where the support is for small museums (Museums Journal November 2005, p4), I am very pleased to say that ALM London and the London Hub have been working very closely together to create a new network of Museum Development Officers (MDOs) for London.
But she is also right to say that there is a level below which hubs, regional agencies and, we would contend, MDOs cannot reach. This often concerns access to advice in areas such as finance, premises, law, fundraising, ICT, personnel and health and safety.
For the London Museums Strategy (planned for publication in February) we have spent a lot of time consulting museums on their needs, and have realised we need a sustainable solution to this issue.
This is a time when government increasingly realises the value for money that comes from delivering services through the voluntary sector.
ALM London has become the first regional agency to win funding from the Home Office ChangeUp voluntary sector capacity building fund.
With this we will run a project to kick start the two-way engagement of museums and the voluntary sector support infrastructure in the capital.
Funding for posts such as MDOs is often time-limited, but as far as advice in general non-museum specific areas is concerned, there is a real opportunity for a more sustainable solution.
Ben Travers, museum development officer, ALM London
Explosive reaction
I have one or two burning issues of my own to share about your article Burning Issues, which reviewed our Gunpowder Treason exhibition at the Tower of London (Museums Journal November 2005, p48-49).
Historic Royal Palaces is the charity that cares for, conserves and presents to the public five of the greatest palaces ever built - The Tower of London is one of them.
New exhibitions such as Gunpowder Treason help to attract visitors to our palaces where they can find out about major events in the nation's history, where it happened. Your reviewer Laura Drysdale wonders if the same experience could be had remotely, on a website. We believe not.
I cannot agree that a 'full-on', 'adult', 18-certificate exhibition is the way to help everyone to explore the subject of the Gunpowder Plot, as Drysdale's son's reaction to the very thought of the Torture at the Tower exhibition shows (actually a sober and educational experience, rather than gory).
The Gunpowder Treason exhibition illustrates graphically the intentions of the plotters, their capture, the process of extracting Fawkes's confession and the plotters' fate in ways accessible to all. 'Playing the relevance card' is, in our view, something to celebrate.
We set out to draw parallels with terrorism today, religious intolerance and state over-reaction. This might be taking visitors into unusual territory but what can be more important than learning about common human experiences that cross the ages?
Michael Day, chief executive, Historic Royal Palaces
Dip into the pool of knowledge
Sharon Heal asks in her editorial (Museums Journal, November 2005, p4): 'If you were a small, independent museum with few or no paid staff, where would you turn for advice?'
In the same issue, Nikola Burdon (MJ, November 2005, p16-17) identifies the effect poor knowledge management has had on the ability of museum staff to assimilate and pass on expertise.
Jane Morris quotes Abigail Walker at the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council (MJ, November 2005, p31) admitting that knowledge-sharing is often over-reliant on personal contacts.
Knowledge about collections was a problem that the Social History Curators Group (SHCG) recognised in 2000 and addressed via a website called firstBASE (www.shcg.org.uk/firstbase/), a starting point for the lone or unsure curator.
For example, a curator in a small museum needing a recommendation of a book to answer an enquiry on friendly societies, or wanting advice from another museum that has a strong collection of domestic lighting, or needing to know where there is a reliable website that would help to identify medicine bottles, should be able to find what they need from firstBASE.
This is hopefully a resource that the SHCG membership is well aware of, and we continue to build the content based on recommendations from peers, as well as through the hard work of our firstBASE team. However, we would positively welcome input from any colleagues who have suggestions for content.
Briony Hudson, SHCG chair/keeper of the museum collections, Royal Pharmaceutical Society
Tackling entry-level recruitment
Adam White calls for a review of museum studies courses because there are too many of them, producing a surplus of applicants (Museums Journal December 2005, p12). He could be right; and there are many other issues surrounding the ways in which people enter the museum profession.
What specialist knowledge and skills do new entrants need? Does the current system discriminate against people who can't afford to do voluntary work or pay postgraduate fees? Do museums take sufficient responsibility for training and developing future professionals?
The University of East Anglia has offered a part-time visiting fellowship to Maurice Davies, the deputy director of the Museums Association, so that he can look at these questions. We're also delighted that Creative and Cultural Skills is helping to fund a symposium at which invited museum employers will explore entry to the workforce in more depth.
The first step will be information gathering, from museums, individuals and course providers. If you have recent experience of entry-level recruitment or views about the selection and training of new entrants contact
maurice@museumsassociation.org
Nichola Johnson, director, Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts, University of East Anglia; Maurice Davies, deputy director, Museums Association
I was fascinated by Aysha Afridi's beautifully written and thought-provoking article on the Diversify scheme (Museums Journal November 2005, p16-17). Is there not an element of 'trying to carry water in a sieve' about all social engineering?
I went to university at Queen Mary College in east London at the end of the 1950s. Many of my fellow students were the products of working class homes and the London grammar schools.
They went on to become university lecturers, teachers, professionals and managers of various kinds; most married and had families, and their children have grown up in middle class homes.
Afridi says many of her fellow Diversify Positive Action Trainees were from the middle class end of the spectrum and could have afforded postgraduate training.
Was this because their parents or grandparents had got their hands dirty, working hard to improve the lot of their offspring? Should such families be expected to support their children through postgraduate training as well?
Afridi also comments that Diversify trainees should not be expected to specialise in the art from their own ethnic background, but that many seem to have gone in the opposite direction. Are these the trainees who will be most valuable in the future?
Someone developing a passion for art from another culture may well combine this passion with a deep-rooted, perhaps subconscious, understanding of art from their own cultural background.
Will this do more to bring the cultures together than someone who remains steeped in their own background? After all, most of us become fascinated by our own roots and cultural background as we become older, so youth is the time to spread our wings.
Culture Secretary David Lammy at a Black History Month event at the British Museum welcomed progress in diversifying audiences but lamented lack of progress in the workforce. Does one not follow from the other?
Visits foster interest. By the time the children visiting museums today finish at university and consider a career, will Afridi and some of her Diversify colleagues hold senior posts in museums and galleries and be the role models of the future?
If Lammy can look back when he is in his 60s across 30 years of steady progress, that will surely be success worth celebrating.
Carol Bunbury, member of British Association of Friends of Museums
It was useful to hear Afridi's views and I agree with her that this sector has a problem in attracting people from non-traditional, non-middle-class backgrounds.
However, I disagree with her assertion that the Museums Association (MA) has shot itself in the foot with the Diversify scheme by employing trainees from only privileged backgrounds. Diversify isn't about class and never set out to be.
Out of the 56 people who are participating in the scheme some may well be from middle-class families, but some are not. We have never taken it upon ourselves to ask people applying to the scheme what social background they come from.
The scheme focuses on encouraging people from African, Caribbean, Asian and Chinese communities to consider training for future employment in the museum sector and we are able to do this under the terms of the Race Relations Act (1976).
It would be complex and a potential legal minefield to introduce a further set of criteria which selected people on their social background as well, and I'm sure the MA would come into criticism for this.
Diversify is not tokenistic nor a one-off; it has become sustainable, with many host museums looking creatively at their budgets in order to establish positive action training initiatives that are not reliant on central government funding.
This has to be a good thing as it is simply unacceptable that our workforce does not currently reflect the UK population. Diversify is beginning to readdress this imbalance and is doing so with considerable success.
The clear focus of the scheme is an important part of its success. The MA is very interested in wider issues of entry to the museum profession and hopes to investigate and stimulate discussion about this.
Lucy Shaw, Diversify coordinator, Museums Association
Voluntary sector offers a solution
With reference to Sharon Heal's editorial asking where the support is for small museums (Museums Journal November 2005, p4), I am very pleased to say that ALM London and the London Hub have been working very closely together to create a new network of Museum Development Officers (MDOs) for London.
But she is also right to say that there is a level below which hubs, regional agencies and, we would contend, MDOs cannot reach. This often concerns access to advice in areas such as finance, premises, law, fundraising, ICT, personnel and health and safety.
For the London Museums Strategy (planned for publication in February) we have spent a lot of time consulting museums on their needs, and have realised we need a sustainable solution to this issue.
This is a time when government increasingly realises the value for money that comes from delivering services through the voluntary sector.
ALM London has become the first regional agency to win funding from the Home Office ChangeUp voluntary sector capacity building fund.
With this we will run a project to kick start the two-way engagement of museums and the voluntary sector support infrastructure in the capital.
Funding for posts such as MDOs is often time-limited, but as far as advice in general non-museum specific areas is concerned, there is a real opportunity for a more sustainable solution.
Ben Travers, museum development officer, ALM London
Explosive reaction
I have one or two burning issues of my own to share about your article Burning Issues, which reviewed our Gunpowder Treason exhibition at the Tower of London (Museums Journal November 2005, p48-49).
Historic Royal Palaces is the charity that cares for, conserves and presents to the public five of the greatest palaces ever built - The Tower of London is one of them.
New exhibitions such as Gunpowder Treason help to attract visitors to our palaces where they can find out about major events in the nation's history, where it happened. Your reviewer Laura Drysdale wonders if the same experience could be had remotely, on a website. We believe not.
I cannot agree that a 'full-on', 'adult', 18-certificate exhibition is the way to help everyone to explore the subject of the Gunpowder Plot, as Drysdale's son's reaction to the very thought of the Torture at the Tower exhibition shows (actually a sober and educational experience, rather than gory).
The Gunpowder Treason exhibition illustrates graphically the intentions of the plotters, their capture, the process of extracting Fawkes's confession and the plotters' fate in ways accessible to all. 'Playing the relevance card' is, in our view, something to celebrate.
We set out to draw parallels with terrorism today, religious intolerance and state over-reaction. This might be taking visitors into unusual territory but what can be more important than learning about common human experiences that cross the ages?
Michael Day, chief executive, Historic Royal Palaces
Dip into the pool of knowledge
Sharon Heal asks in her editorial (Museums Journal, November 2005, p4): 'If you were a small, independent museum with few or no paid staff, where would you turn for advice?'
In the same issue, Nikola Burdon (MJ, November 2005, p16-17) identifies the effect poor knowledge management has had on the ability of museum staff to assimilate and pass on expertise.
Jane Morris quotes Abigail Walker at the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council (MJ, November 2005, p31) admitting that knowledge-sharing is often over-reliant on personal contacts.
Knowledge about collections was a problem that the Social History Curators Group (SHCG) recognised in 2000 and addressed via a website called firstBASE (www.shcg.org.uk/firstbase/), a starting point for the lone or unsure curator.
For example, a curator in a small museum needing a recommendation of a book to answer an enquiry on friendly societies, or wanting advice from another museum that has a strong collection of domestic lighting, or needing to know where there is a reliable website that would help to identify medicine bottles, should be able to find what they need from firstBASE.
This is hopefully a resource that the SHCG membership is well aware of, and we continue to build the content based on recommendations from peers, as well as through the hard work of our firstBASE team. However, we would positively welcome input from any colleagues who have suggestions for content.
Briony Hudson, SHCG chair/keeper of the museum collections, Royal Pharmaceutical Society
Tackling entry-level recruitment
Adam White calls for a review of museum studies courses because there are too many of them, producing a surplus of applicants (Museums Journal December 2005, p12). He could be right; and there are many other issues surrounding the ways in which people enter the museum profession.
What specialist knowledge and skills do new entrants need? Does the current system discriminate against people who can't afford to do voluntary work or pay postgraduate fees? Do museums take sufficient responsibility for training and developing future professionals?
The University of East Anglia has offered a part-time visiting fellowship to Maurice Davies, the deputy director of the Museums Association, so that he can look at these questions. We're also delighted that Creative and Cultural Skills is helping to fund a symposium at which invited museum employers will explore entry to the workforce in more depth.
The first step will be information gathering, from museums, individuals and course providers. If you have recent experience of entry-level recruitment or views about the selection and training of new entrants contact
maurice@museumsassociation.org
Nichola Johnson, director, Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts, University of East Anglia; Maurice Davies, deputy director, Museums Association
