The CRCS Build-a-Museum Team Newsletter

Announcement - February 1, 2004 :

What a Great Natural History Museum Means to a Flagship University

Bruce J. MacFadden, Associate Director of Exhibits and Public Programs and Curator of Vertebrate Paleontology, Florida Museum of Natural History, University of Florida

Most flagship universities are comprehensive institutions of higher education with a public education mission. These universities benefit greatly from a diverse curriculum and resources largely unavailable to smaller institutions. For over a century university-based natural history museums have played a vital role in preparing undergraduate students for advanced degrees, educating graduate students for careers in academia, government, and museums, and disseminating natural history research to the public. The museum is also a center for collection-based research and an important resource for attracting students and faculty to the university, and visitors to the region.

In the context of the 21st century, university natural history museums play all the more vital role within the fabric of state flagship universities. With the public concern for environmental awareness and loss of the world's biodiversity, along with affiliated teaching departments (e.g., anthropology, biology, botany, geology, wildlife, and/or zoology), natural history museums fulfill the role as repositories of specimens and data relevant to these critical disciplines. There is an urgent national agenda to promote public awareness of science, through both formal and informal venues, the latter of which include natural history museums. Capitalizing on these initiatives and priorities, over the past decade major new natural history museum initiatives have been realized, or are underway, at flagship institutions in California, Florida, Oklahoma, and Utah.

The Florida Museum of Natural History, founded in 1917, contains 25 million specimens and artifacts, conducts research, teaches students, and has an active program of public education and exhibitions. The FLMNH serves both the State and University of Florida. Within the past decade the FLMNH has experienced a major growth phase in which together 90,000 square feet of new space has been devoted to a public exhibition and education center and the new McGuire Lepidoptera Center and Biodiversity Institute.

__________________________________

Additional reading:

MacFadden, B. J. and B. D. Camp. 2001. University natural history museums: The public education mission. Curator: The Museum Journal. 43(2):123-138.