Online course on museum registration

MS103: The Basics of Museum Registration
Instructor: Peggy Schaller
September 17 to October 13, 2007
Price: $425

The Northern States Conservation Center
<URL:http://www.collectioncare.org> is pleased to announce the
return of one of its building-block courses: The Basics of Museum.
Registration at <URL:http://www.museumclasses.org>.

This course covers the basics of museum record keeping. The mission
statement is emphasized as the foundation for the museum. Then
students learn of the importance of establishing set policies and
procedures. The terms 'registration' and 'accession' will be defined
and the process discussed. Three common types of numbering systems
will be reviewed and the answer to the question "Why do museums put
those little bitty numbers on all their artifacts?" will be
revealed. Finally, the Museum Registration Manual, its importance
for the museum and what it should contain will be reviewed.

Participants will be asked to create a mission statement, collection
policy and acquisition policy for a 'new' museum; comment on one of
the selected readings about museum missions; complete an
accessioning exercise; and for the final class project create a
sample registration manual for our 'new' museum.

Class Outline:

    Introduction
    The Museum Mission Statement
    Accessioning and Numbering
    Registration Manual
    Conclusion

The course format is self-paced through 5 sections. The instructor
will be available at predetermined intervals throughout the course.
Students will be working individually and interact through forums
and scheduled on-line chats. Materials include web versions of
reading materials and lecture notes. Supporting resources include
message forums, weekly online chats, email support, projects,
quizzes, and links to relevant websites.

The course will last for four weeks and cover all the details needed
to begin processing a collection. This course will include handouts,
on-line literature, slide lectures, and
student-teacher/group-teacher dialog. The course is limited to 20
participants.

If you are interested in the course, please sign up at
<URL:http://www.museumclasses.org> and pay for the course at
<URL:http://www.collectioncare.org/tas/tas.html>.  If you have
trouble with either, please contact Helen Alten
<helen [at] collectioncare__org>.

About the instructor: Peggy Schaller is the President of Collections
Research for Museums in Denver, Colorado. She has a BA in
Anthropology with minors in Art History and Geology from the
University of Arizona in Tucson, a MA in Anthropology with a minor
in Museum Studies from the University of Colorado in Boulder, and I
am a Certified Institutional Protection Specialist.

Peggy Schaller established Collections Research for Museums, a
museum consulting firm that specializes in cataloging/collection
management training and services, in November 1991. It is the
mission of Collections Research for Museums to inspire museums to
improve their professional standards, collections stewardship and
service to their constituency through training in, and assistance
with, documenting, preserving, protecting and managing their
collections. During the last 13 years, I have worked with numerous
museums and institutions and many different types of collections.


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                  Conservation DistList Instance 21:21
                Distributed: Tuesday, September 4, 2007
                       Message Id: cdl-21-21-015
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