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Out of the Blue: A Punderful Session About Out-of-the-Box Thinking

By Juliana Venegas

I love a good pun, so when I saw a session at the 2018 Annual Meeting and Museum Expo about whales and puns, I was hooked! The session began with an emotional video about nine blue whales that died in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. People …
Tips and Takeaways from the Historic House Summit: Starting the Marathon of Digital Content Strategy

By Zachary Wnek

During the end of March 2018, the American Alliance of Museums hosted the Historic House Museum Summit at George Washington’s Mount Vernon. I have decided that trying (and failing) to tell you about all of the fantastic sessions, topics …
AAM’s New Code of Conduct Inspires Conversation About Gender

By Andrea Jones

Each year, the Alliance recruits 10-12 people to be Social Media Journalists – to tweet and share conference happenings for those who don’t attend or just want to follow along with all the fun. As one of those chosen for the role in …
The Reinforcement Crew: Colleagues Helping Colleagues

By Libby Krecek,

Each year since 2007 museum collections professionals from around the nation have donated their time and expertise to help other institutions in need. This wonderful program improves the stewardship of cultural heritage collections …
Practice Makes Perfect: 4 Keys to Exhibit Prototyping Success

By David Whitemyer, AIA

If you’ve ever cut out a piece of cardboard the size of an exhibit graphic panel and taped it to a wall to see if it’s at a readable height, that’s prototyping. Creating a beta version of a digital interactive and inviting children to play …
Change is in the air!

By Stephanie Shapiro

PIC-Green In the 2007 Application to form the Professional Interest Committee on Green Museums, John W. Jacobsen wrote, “…over at least the next decade, we have a lot of work to do, and many challenges that require creative innovations. …
With Liberty and Justice for All!

By Laura Lott

One hundred and thirty-three years after the Statue of Liberty first arrived in New York harbor, to the day, my husband and I took our daughter to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island on Father’s Day. Our almost-six-year-old has been …
What Small Museums Need (& Don’t)

By Allison Titman

Over the course of 2016, ten small museums participated in an AAM pilot project called the Small Museum Accreditation Academy. The Academy, which was developed through a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, was designed to help …
Meeting Teachers Where They Are

By Meg Davis

As an elementary school teacher in New York City, I LOVED field trips. In my final year of teaching, I was lucky enough to find a school that not only encouraged them but purposely made “experiential learning” part of the curriculum. My …
What It Takes to Engage Teachers with Digital Museum Resources: Five Lessons Learned

By Michelle Knovic Smith

Wherever you are on the journey to digitize museum collections, there are questions to address regarding who will use these millions of digital assets, and how. Teachers and their students seem to be obvious audiences, but what does it …