New Museums and Heritage Masters Programme Organise Symposium in Glasgow

The first group of students to participate in the new Master’s in Education in Museums and Heritage (EDUMaH) were given a warm welcome last week in Glasgow. The programme, which is funded through the Erasmus Mundus international programme, has students participating  from all over the world. It involves a consortium of universities from Tartu in Estonia, Valetta in Malta, Radboud in the Netherlands, Dublin and Cork in Ireland, Mexico City and the European Museum Academy.

The idea  for this programme first grew out of an initial dialogue between the PASCAL Learning Cities Network and the European Museum Academy, which brought partners together to look at ways of cooperating, which led the way to the setting up of this new Masters programme. 

The  EDUMaH  consortium arranged a symposium as an appetiser and introduction with keynote speakers from a variety of people engaged in museum education, coming from both practice and research. Gundy van Dijk from Van Gogh Museum [2] showed how the museum can inspire people with psychological challenges and stimulate through creative exercises. Natalie McGuire from Barbados Museum and Historical Society [3] presented a number of examples on how the population in Barbados can take back and re-shape heritage and narratives through engaging with objects. Alexandra Bounia from University of the Aegean [4] presented ideas that offered new perspective on aims and outcomes in museum education. Lisa Heinis from the Museum Boijmans van Beuningen [5] illustrated how the alternative presentation of artworks offer new opportunities and challenges for visitors and learners. The UNESCO Chair Refugee Integration through Languages and the Arts (RILA) [6], artist in residence at University of Glasgow, Tawona Sithole, gave voice and sound to forgotten and suppressed creative and artistic heritage.

At a round table discussion representatives from the EDUMaH consortium partners discussed challenges and visions for museum and heritage education. The colleagues saw the remarkable growth and professionalisation in museum and heritage education as a symptom of both the need for the field and an opportunity for optimism. It was noted that  there are also new challenges emerging that arise from populist, xenophobic, anti-climate-crisis voices, and nationalist movements which are  seeking to challenge museum and heritage education, and this will need to be addressed in future work.

Rob Mark, University of Glasgow and PASCAL LCNs co-ordinator

Henrik Zipsane, President of the European Museum Academy, and Co-Cordinator of the PASCAL LCN Cultural and Creative Industries.

Dr Henrik Zipsane, Dr Rob Mark, and Dr Karl B Murr, European Museum Academy

Partners

Maggie Mccoll, Programme Director