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Dr. Lucy Townsend |
Dr. Lucy Townsend, curator of the Blackwell Museum, is a principal faculty member in the Museum Studies Interdisciplinary Graduate Certificate Program and teaches ART 557 (Museum Education). The excellent quality of the Museum Studies Program is demonstrated by several recent awards and recognition:
The Illinois Association of Museums (IAM) awarded "Examining Audubon" the Superior Achievement Award in the museum exhibitions category. The IAM Superior Achievement Award recognizes achievement that is a model for the profession and reaches a greater audience than is normally reached by an institution. This award is generally granted to one or two museum exhibitions within the state of Illinois each year.
"Examining Audubon" was curated by the Spring 2008 ART 556 Museum Exhibitions and Interpretation class for the NIU Art Museum.
"To the best of my knowledge," said Peter Van Ael, chair of NIU's Museum Studies Committee, "this is the first time this prestigious award recognizes an exhibition curated within the setting of a museum studies program."
The award validates the strengths and contributions the NIU Interdisciplinary Graduate Certificate Program in Museum Studies brings to the museum profession. It also brings critical recognition to the NIU Museum Studies Program, the NIU Art Museum, and the University as a whole.
The award presentation took place on September 25 at the annual IAM Conference in Elmhurst, IL.
Pam Rohleder, the director/curator of the Bartlett History Museum and student in the NIU Museum Studies Program, was awarded an IAM Superior Achievement Award in the Special Projects category for the one-time event "Her Story, Meet the Remarkable Women of Early Bartlett."
For this event, Rohleder displayed an exhibition on early Bartlett women and their contributions to their community in a time when most women did not work outside the home. Actresses portrayed the women to bring them vividly to life.
Sheldon Shaeffer, Director, UNESCO, Bangkok, Thailand, reports that the Burmese Ministry of Culture has approved the participation of Dr Catherine Raymond in the UNESCO-sponsored project, "Preservation of Endangered Movable Cultural Heritage in Myanmar." The project is designed to foster long-term partnerships between museums in the Southern Hemisphere and museums and/or universities in the Northern Hemisphere for mutual exchange and collaboration.
Dr. Raymond will represent Northern Illinois University (NIU), in DeKalb, Illinois, where she holds the position of Associate Professor in Southeast Asian Art History and curates the Center for Burma Studies' collection of movable objects. NIU's Center for Burma Studies has agreed to be the partner from the Northern Hemisphere for this project.
Shaeffer stated, "In our opinion, [this] is an excellent prospect for professional and academic exchange. Dr. Raymond's participation in the mission would provide an opportunity to discuss details of the modalities for NIU's involvement."
The A. P. Randolph Pullman Porter Museum that Lyn Hughes founded in 1995 in Chicago was featured in a Good Morning America segment on September 18, 2008.
Hughes writes to her colleagues in Museum Studies:
I want to say to you: the museum field is . . . not always recognized and/or rewarded. But if this is in fact something what you are drawn to, be committed and stay true to yourself and your work. That is the most important thing, and it can be personally very rewarding. And who knows, sometimes recognition may come from outside and give you a little battery charge, even when you are not expecting it!!