Category Archives: Training

Plenty for Historic Sites at 2015 NCPH Meeting

National Council on Public History annual meeting 2015The National Council on Public History will be holding its 2015 conference in Nashville from April 15-18 and there are lots of sessions that will interest house museums and historic sites, including:

  • Best Practices for Interpreting Slavery at Historic Sites and Museums
  • Re-imagining Historic House Museums for the 21st Century with President Lincoln’s Cottage, Roger Brown Study Collection, and others
  • On the Cutting Edge of American Historic Preservation:  The Role of the Mount Vernon Ladies’ Association
  • Religion, Historic Sites, and Museums with Gettysburg Seminary Ridge Museum, Ephrata Cloister, and others
  • Historic Sites, Racialized Geographies, and the Responsibilities of Public Historians with the Lower East Side Tenement Museum and Weeksville Heritage Center
  • The Woodrow Wilson Family Home: Our Story of a Radical Makeover
  • Pulling Back the Curtain: Displaying the History-Making Process in Museums and Sites
  • Hidden Histories:  Cultural Amnesia, Interpretive Challenges, and Educational Opportunities
  • Haunted Histories: Ghost Lore Interpretation at Historical Sites

Nashville also has many historic sites and NCPH will be offering walking tours and field trips on musical heritage, the state capitol, crime, Civil War, civil rights, and Fisk University.  Nearby are several notable historic house museums, including the Hermitage, Belle Meade Plantation, and Belmont Mansion.

Registration is $240 and for members it’s $192.  Sign up before March 4 as a member, and it’s only $167.  For a copy of the preliminary program, visit http://bit.ly/NCPH2015prog.

September Symposium on Interpreting the Victorian House

The Glessner House Museum and the Victorian Society in America host a day-long symposium on the interpretation of the Victorian house on Saturday, September 27, 2014 from 9:00 am to 4:00 pm at the Glessner House Museum in Chicago. Speakers include:

  • Richard Guy Wilson, keynote speaker and Commonwealth Professor’s Chair in Architectural History, University of Virginia on “Creating the Victorian House”
  • Laura Gundrum, Chief of Interpretation, Lincoln Home on “Interpreting Abraham Lincoln as a Family Man at Lincoln Home”
  • Lise Dube-Scherr, Executive Director, Richard H. Driehaus Museum on “Contemporary Perspectives on Historic Houses: Building Community through Diversified Programming”
  • Marta Wojcik, Executive Director and Curator, Frank Lloyd Wright’s Westcott House and Westcott Center for Architecture + Design on “A Frank Lloyd Wright House as a Community Anchor”

Continue reading →

Online Learning Opportunities for Historic Site Interpreters

The opportunities for sharpening your skills as an historic site interpreter continue to grow online, sometimes even for free.  Here are a sampling of a few non-degree granting organizations where you’ll find workshops and classes on the Internet to keep your thinking fresh and improve your technique.  All times are Eastern unless noted.

American Alliance of Museums

  • Embracing 360 Engagement, Widening the Circle.  September 2, 2014 at 2:00 pm Eastern.
  • Building Trust through High Performance, Becoming Essential.  December 3 at 2:00 pm.

American Association for State and Local History

  • Historic House Calls: Using Futures Thinking to Navigate Ongoing Change.  August 20, 2014 at 2:00 pm. Free for AASLH members.
  • Writing the Grant: What’s the Process Like?  August 27 at 3:00 pm.  $115; $40 members.

Coursera

Continue reading →

AASLH Annual Meeting in September Offers Lots for Historic Sites

Alexander Ramsey House in St. Paul, an historic site of the Minnesota Historical Society.

Alexander Ramsey House in St. Paul, an historic site of the Minnesota Historical Society.

Historic sites and house museums will find lots of educational sessions and workshops just for them at the upcoming annual meeting of the American Association for State and Local History on September 17-20 in St. Paul, Minnesota (the right half of the Twin Cities).  There are more than 70 sessions and workshops offered this year, so I’m only highlighting a few to show the diversity of topics on or about historic sites:

  • Putting the Native American Voice into Historic Sites
  • Saving the Charnley Norwood House
  • Interpreting Religion at Historic House Museums
  • Two Very Different Historic Houses Ask:  We Got the Money–Now What?
  • Telling a Whole History:  Methods of Interpreting Domestic Servants
  • Welcoming All Visitors:  Accessible Programs at History Museums and Sites
  • Diversity and Inclusion:  What Does that Really Mean for Museums and Historic Sites?
  • Diversity in Education:  Teaching About Slavery, Innovative Strategies, and Best Practices
  • Making the Invisible Visible:  Using Mobile Technology to Reach New Audiences, Improve Accessibility, and Breathe New Life into a Virginia Historic Site
  • Redefining Success:  Tips and Techniques for Training Interpreters to Talk About Slavery
  • They Can’t All be Museums
  • Pocket Change:  Moving a House Museum into the 21st Century on a Budget

Of course, there are many more sessions that address related topics, such as boards, fundraising, Continue reading →

Snapshots from the AAM Annual Meeting in Seattle

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The American Alliance of Museums finished up their annual meeting in Seattle this week with about 5,000 people in attendance, including many from China, England, and Canada.  The weather was jaw-dropping beautiful so trading it for the sessions indoors was a dilemma at times, but nothing would have pulled me away from the opening plenary which featured Erik Larson, author of Isaac’s Storm and Devil in the White City, who discussed his process for writing these histories.   He doesn’t think of himself as an historian, however, but as an “animator of history” who seeks to “create a rich historical experience.”  Hmm.  Sounds like what historic sites do.  I was also provoked by several very intriguing sessions related to history museums and I’ll be sharing highlights soon.  In the meantime, enjoy these snapshots from the annual meeting.

Grease the Gears of Your Next Meeting

meetingsWe are in meetings regularly but how many of them are productive?  The minutes grind by slowly as the group argues over what it’s supposed to be doing and everyone is anxious to get back to their desks.  A couple weeks later, you repeat the same meeting because no one remembers what was decided or who was responsible.  I’ve been there hundreds of times but it improved about fifteen years ago when I began following the principles in How to Make Meetings Work by Michael Doyle and David Strauss (1993).  It introduced me to the value of agendas, the decision-making process, and the important role of a facilitator.  The facilitator is a neutral third party whose sole purpose is to manage the meeting process and ensure it is productive.  He or she doesn’t make decisions but helps the group discuss issues collegially to arrive at decisions thoughtfully.  The facilitator makes meetings easier, putting grease on the gears that would otherwise grind and bind.  If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you are probably serve as a facilitator from time to time.

Over the years I’ve become increasingly aware of the importance of facilitation, especially as organizations move from a top-down, command-and-control form of management to Continue reading →

Webinar: Better Board Governance

Stanford Social Innovation Review, a quarterly journal devoted to informing and inspiring leaders of social change, is hosting a free hour-long webinar on improving board performance on Wednesday, May 21, 2014 at 2 pm Eastern/11 am Pacific. This webinar is for non-profit board members, executive directors, and managers/staff who work with board members—anyone who seeks to create an organization with consistently effective governance in order to radically increase impact for its community and visitors.  Thanks to the support of the Henry R. Kravis Prize in Leadership, this webinar is free but advance registration is required.

In this webinar you will learn the nine attributes of effective nonprofit board governance and be able to make significant improvements in your organization’s board. Join Kim Starkey Jonker and William F. Meehan III as they expand on their recent Stanford Social Innovation Review article, “A Better Board Will Make You Better.” They will discuss the difficulties of achieving consistently effective governance and provide actionable suggestions for overcoming these challenges. Kathy Spahn, recipient of the 2014 Henry R. Kravis Prize in Leadership, will join Jonker and Meehan to discuss Helen Keller International’s governance experiences and provide real-world examples about what works. 

 

What’s the ROI of Your Historic Site?

Jack Phillips (right) discussing ROI at ASTD 2014.

Jack Phillips (right) discussing ROI at ASTD 2014.

Foundations and donors are increasingly questioning the impact of their funds at museums and historic sites, a trend that’s growing as well in  business according to Jack Phillips and James Kirkpatrick at a session at the ASTD conference yesterday. After the recent recession, they’ve found that CEOs are increasingly asking about the return on investment (ROI) of every program and activity, including employee training and education.  Although training claims to be an essential contributor to business productivity and performance, it hasn’t been adequately measured or evaluated, and thus can’t prove their value.  That surprised me because I thought that was a struggle only for museums and historic sites.  We seem to be continually fighting to prove our worth and other than economic impact, haven’t been able to show why we matter in our communities.  It looks like we’re not alone.

Phillips and Kirkpatrick are the leaders in the field of measuring performance in business and developed frameworks that “define the levels at which programs are evaluated and how data are captured at different times from different sources.”  Although they disagree on whether the framework should have four or five levels, they both agree that Continue reading →

Getting the Big Picture of Training

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This week I’m attending the annual conference of the American Society of Training and Development (ASTD) in Washington, DC, the “world’s largest professional association dedicated to the training and development field.”  There must be thousands of people attending from all over the world and hundreds of educational sessions on training technology, meeting facilitation, staff management, career development, learning measurement, science of learning, and leadership development.  As someone who specializes in interpretation and education at museums and historic sites, it puts my work in a global perspective and I quickly realized that while business spends more than $160 billion (yes, billion) annually on workforce learning to maximize their return on investment, non-profit organizations do very little in this area.  Thankfully, many of our professional associations provide this essential service.

Although I won’t be able to share everything I learn at the conference this week, I’ll try to share some highlights.  Yesterday Ruth Clark, author of Evidence-Based Training Methods, discussed some of the misconceptions around learning styles, a framework that Continue reading →

Webinar: Making Heritage Tourism Work for Your Community

Walking tour of historic Monterey, California.

Walking tour of historic Monterey, California.

Heritage tourism is a growing industry that can improve community engagement, economic revitalization, and preservation advocacy. People want authentic and meaningful experiences—and are willing to pay for them.  On May 13, 2014 from 12 noon to 1:30 pm Pacific Time, I’ll be presenting a webinar for the California Preservation Foundation exploring the benefits of heritage tourism and how it may (or may not) benefit your community or region. We will examine the latest research on the motivations and interests of tourists (they’re not all alike), how to identify or create destinations that will attract tourists, and how to build support and attract funding for a heritage tourism program.  You’ll learn the overall elements of a heritage tourism program and leave with a list of the next steps to take in your community.  Although much of the webinar will be focused on California, the principles and process for developing a heritage tourism program will be same for other places.  Cost is $45 for CPF members ($60 for non-members) and advance registration is required.

It’s part of a three-part webinar series on economic development using historic preservation from the California Preservation Foundation.  For those interested in continuing education credit, it’s available for AIA, AICP, and ASLA.