2007-10-09

Putting the ‘Public’ in Public Programs: An Inclusive Approach to Program Development in Museums

This paper outlines how museums could better address the process of developing public programs. It presents a strategy for involving community members more meaningfully in the program development process, in a way that can be tailored to the specific audiences of individual museums. It also addresses the contribution that community-based programs make in fostering diverse museum audiences and points towards ways of expanding sustainable audience support.

An examination of current public programs, art work projects and available toolkits provides a view of the landscape in which this kind of strategy would be placed. This initiative is different from other offerings in that it will literally put the public back in public programs, by encouraging the participation of a diverse populace in the planning process. It proposes that an innovative methodology, which draws on aspects of evaluation research, action research and ethnography, can facilitate a new paradigm for public program development.

This combination of approaches, while employing the methods of surveys, focus groups and interviews, produces rich and varied data which aids in more imaginative and innovative ways of involving museum users throughout the program design and development process.

Download of the paper: http://www.city.ac.uk/cpm/ejournal/ejournal_Kimberly_Keith.pdf

Kimberly Keith, Goldsmiths College, University of London