 |
|
February 2006
The Museum continues to engage a busy schedule of exhibitions, events, and performances. We opened the year with Visions of the Unseen, a focus on Balinese ceremony and myth and are now preparing for a February 28 opening of Rain Forest Visions, an exhibition of indigenous South American pottery and other artworks that reflect aspects of local. The Museum has also hosted a number of special events in the Knight Auditorium including the very popular “Wine and the Vine” featuring Dr. Patrick McGovern of University of Pennsylvania, whose research focuses on the origins and spread of wine and viniculture.
At the end of each year, the Museum sets a number of goals we hope to achieve in the next academic cycle (see Director’s letter FY’06). We are proud to report that a number of our goals for this year have already been realized. This fall, the Museum received a wonderful gift from Dr. Allan and Marlene Campbell in support of our rotating gallery. In gratitude for their generosity, the gallery has been renamed the “Campbell Gallery”. Thanks to a generous gift from Ms. Betty Ann Knight, with matching funds from the campus, the Museum is now open on Sundays, and we hope you will enjoy this new opportunity to visit us.
The Museum has also finished the first phase of accreditation: our application and accompanying information was filed in December with the American Association of Museums. As many of you know, accreditation is acknowledgment by our peers that the Spurlock Museum adheres to all AAM guidelines at the highest level. (Currently, only 750 museums across the country hold accreditation.) After the AAM reviews our application, they will notify us as to when we can begin the second of three stages of the process.
As noted in my last letter, we are preparing to offer a Museum Studies Program to our University students. Officially classified as a “minor,” the curriculum will consist of three required and two elective courses. The capstone experience for our students will be the internship. The latter is made possible by our collaboration with the Museum of the Cross Roads Consortium, which encompasses the various museums, planetariums, and natural history learning centers in our community. With their gracious cooperation, our students will be able to gain hands-on experience in a variety of working museums, an important experience in any well-rounded professional curriculum. The Museum is currently working on the necessary application forms for new course offerings and for official status of the minor.
The Spurlock, as part of a national trend, is also evaluating its role as an information service organization. Because museums and museum professionals have found themselves facing new questions and new problems regarding the access and use of their electronic records –for example, anyone accessing a computer can retrieve Spurlock Museum collections, exhibitions and educational data-- the way our information is used becomes an important practical as well as ethical issue. The Museum Studies coursework will also include information technology so that our students will have the most up-to-date learning experience and the skills needed to compete for jobs in the museum field.
As our immediate and long-term vision for the museum becomes a reality, we hope you will continue to support our endeavors and visit us frequently.
|
|
 |
|
