The future of the Big Pit
Congratulations to the Big Pit for its magnificent Gulbenkian Prize win (Museums Journal July 2005, p13). As has been noted, fundamental to the museum's success is its staff, charismatic former miners providing a tangible link with the reality of pit life.
But this begs some important questions. When the current generation of interpreters is gone and the direct link severed, can the Big Pit maintain the same impact?
Furthermore, the Gulbenkian award recognised the Big Pit's ability to foster learning by engaging visitors at an emotional level. The challenge for the smart new-builds, with expensive high-tech displays and cutting edge architecture (such as the National Waterfront Museum, Swansea, also part of the National Museums and Galleries of Wales) is to find equally powerful ways to engage with their visitors on a personal level.
Vicki Wood, freelance museum professional, Oxfordshire
Jobs I: overqualified, underemployed?
I read your editorial - Open up the Routes to Jobs in Museums (Museums Journal August 2005, p4) - with interest. I agree with the idea of opening up museum jobs to those who have not been able or have chosen not to undertake higher education.
However, I'd like to point out that having university qualifications is no guarantee of a museum job. I have been attempting to gain employment in the museum sector for around two years since graduating from a well-respected History of Design MA programme.
So far, I have only been able to get work as a front-of-house worker. This has been good personal experience for me, but has not helped my CV a great deal.
There is a huge gap between qualification and employment. I have now managed to accrue around three months' worth of full-time, unpaid, curatorial experience, but still have difficulty getting interviews and lose out to candidates with more experience.
Why are there not more graduate trainee/internship schemes? I am now 26 and I am becoming increasingly frustrated that someone with my enthusiasm, education and skills is finding it so hard to get that elusive first job.
Gareth Cheeseman, Edinburgh
Jobs 2: volunteer posts are not real posts
My niece, her husband and my daughter-in-law have spent up to five years studying and doing unpaid 'work experience' in order to obtain academic and professional qualifications in museum work, and I am shocked to find that they are offered an abundance of voluntary work, but are having great difficulty in obtaining paid work.
I conclude that the museum sector is either so strapped for cash that it cannot afford to pay the going rate and is being propped up by armies of unpaid volunteers, or perhaps the employers think that so long as people are willing to give their time freely, why pay anyone?
SJ Dibbs, Croydon
Out and about in Warwickshire
The Collections for the Future report covers many of the important ways in which museums use their collections and staff/volunteer expertise, and Warwickshire has some exciting and imaginative examples.
If we want to make real changes to the physical environment, particularly the natural and historic environments away from museum premises, we have to work within larger partnerships and use the unique position that many of us enjoy within local authorities.
Data is an important part of museum collections. Data can help underpin important decisions, such as strategic land use, planning and development control, and setting targets for the agri-environment funding that helps farmers and landowners to improve their land for the benefit of wildlife and people.
Museums that employ or work closely with ecologists and field archaeologists understand this well and are proud and protective of these functions. But these important functions still remain poorly understood within the museum world.
Here are some of the ways that Warwickshire Museum uses its collections, data and expertise to influence the outside world:
Housing and managing the official county datasets for sites and species, usually in partnership with other organisations and local amateur groups; helping to initiate important partnership-driven projects such as Local Biodiversity Action Plans, Local Geological Action Plans, habitat and species surveys, research projects and publications; and helping local communities to develop action plans to conserve their local heritage.
It is helping us to bring about tangible improvements to our county and the quality of life for residents and visitors. Datasets are a crucial part of our collections and can be enormously influential if used in the right way at the right time by museum staff.
Steven Falk, senior keeper of natural history, Warwickshire Museum
Clarification:
Museums Journal August 2005, p11: although one of the initiatives featured was a joint event by the Pitt Rivers Museum and the Oxford University Museum of Natural History, the picture was of the Museum of Natural History, not the Pitt Rivers as stated.
Congratulations to the Big Pit for its magnificent Gulbenkian Prize win (Museums Journal July 2005, p13). As has been noted, fundamental to the museum's success is its staff, charismatic former miners providing a tangible link with the reality of pit life.
But this begs some important questions. When the current generation of interpreters is gone and the direct link severed, can the Big Pit maintain the same impact?
Furthermore, the Gulbenkian award recognised the Big Pit's ability to foster learning by engaging visitors at an emotional level. The challenge for the smart new-builds, with expensive high-tech displays and cutting edge architecture (such as the National Waterfront Museum, Swansea, also part of the National Museums and Galleries of Wales) is to find equally powerful ways to engage with their visitors on a personal level.
Vicki Wood, freelance museum professional, Oxfordshire
Jobs I: overqualified, underemployed?
I read your editorial - Open up the Routes to Jobs in Museums (Museums Journal August 2005, p4) - with interest. I agree with the idea of opening up museum jobs to those who have not been able or have chosen not to undertake higher education.
However, I'd like to point out that having university qualifications is no guarantee of a museum job. I have been attempting to gain employment in the museum sector for around two years since graduating from a well-respected History of Design MA programme.
So far, I have only been able to get work as a front-of-house worker. This has been good personal experience for me, but has not helped my CV a great deal.
There is a huge gap between qualification and employment. I have now managed to accrue around three months' worth of full-time, unpaid, curatorial experience, but still have difficulty getting interviews and lose out to candidates with more experience.
Why are there not more graduate trainee/internship schemes? I am now 26 and I am becoming increasingly frustrated that someone with my enthusiasm, education and skills is finding it so hard to get that elusive first job.
Gareth Cheeseman, Edinburgh
Jobs 2: volunteer posts are not real posts
My niece, her husband and my daughter-in-law have spent up to five years studying and doing unpaid 'work experience' in order to obtain academic and professional qualifications in museum work, and I am shocked to find that they are offered an abundance of voluntary work, but are having great difficulty in obtaining paid work.
I conclude that the museum sector is either so strapped for cash that it cannot afford to pay the going rate and is being propped up by armies of unpaid volunteers, or perhaps the employers think that so long as people are willing to give their time freely, why pay anyone?
SJ Dibbs, Croydon
Out and about in Warwickshire
The Collections for the Future report covers many of the important ways in which museums use their collections and staff/volunteer expertise, and Warwickshire has some exciting and imaginative examples.
If we want to make real changes to the physical environment, particularly the natural and historic environments away from museum premises, we have to work within larger partnerships and use the unique position that many of us enjoy within local authorities.
Data is an important part of museum collections. Data can help underpin important decisions, such as strategic land use, planning and development control, and setting targets for the agri-environment funding that helps farmers and landowners to improve their land for the benefit of wildlife and people.
Museums that employ or work closely with ecologists and field archaeologists understand this well and are proud and protective of these functions. But these important functions still remain poorly understood within the museum world.
Here are some of the ways that Warwickshire Museum uses its collections, data and expertise to influence the outside world:
Housing and managing the official county datasets for sites and species, usually in partnership with other organisations and local amateur groups; helping to initiate important partnership-driven projects such as Local Biodiversity Action Plans, Local Geological Action Plans, habitat and species surveys, research projects and publications; and helping local communities to develop action plans to conserve their local heritage.
It is helping us to bring about tangible improvements to our county and the quality of life for residents and visitors. Datasets are a crucial part of our collections and can be enormously influential if used in the right way at the right time by museum staff.
Steven Falk, senior keeper of natural history, Warwickshire Museum
Clarification:
Museums Journal August 2005, p11: although one of the initiatives featured was a joint event by the Pitt Rivers Museum and the Oxford University Museum of Natural History, the picture was of the Museum of Natural History, not the Pitt Rivers as stated.
