Monday, September 25, 2000
Whale of a lesson
Chancellor’s annual assessment focuses on anti-intellectualism
Football traffic management, tailgating and parking areas revised
Campus Closeup
Newsmakers
Administrative Changes
Sharpening up his skills

Shedding light on buried treasures
By Beth Roberts
beth@uga.edu

UGA’s Museum of Natural History, founded in 1978 and designated the official state museum of natural history this past year, will invite the public into its current home on East Campus Road on Sept. 30 for its first-ever open house. Columns discussed the open house plans with Elizabeth Reitz, director of the museum.

Columns: What’s the purpose of the open house?
Reitz: The open house is a new venture for us. We’re largely a research, collection-management, teaching unit, but we are trying to find a way to be a “real” museum. Most people don’t realize that only about a third of any museum is public and two-thirds is what goes on behind the scenes with the collection. We’re trying to have that public face--to bring the collections to the public.
And we’re trying to do that without the traditional medium of an exhibit hall. That’s how most museums do it.
For the past three years, we’ve been having what we call “walk-abouts” for department heads and deans and members of the press--to try to raise our visibility, but also as a way to practice having the public in our collections with us. We’ve also done a large number of tours. We’ve had about 3,500 people come through this building each of the past three years, by dibbles and drabs, in organized groups. Most museums have exhibits for the public, and once a year they have an open house when they open their collections and say, “Come see what the rest of this building is--see what informs the exhibits.” Museum exhibit programs reflect something that’s in the museum’s collections, and the open house is a way to show that link.
Open houses at museums are extremely popular. The public shows up in droves. The collection staff looks to an open house with some dread, of course--but it’s very inspirational to have all these people asking questions.

Columns: Are you concerned about damaging the collections?
Reitz: We have had a few discussions about that. We’re going to try to say that if it’s within arm’s reach, it can be touched. And if you don’t want it to be touched--just looked at--then you put it where little hands (or big hands) can’t reach it. The idea is to invite the public in and enjoy the experience.

Columns: I suppose the real danger is more people than room.
Reitz: That’s why we’re not advertising to the general public this year. Next year we’ll have a better idea of numbers, and we’ll do a better job of publicizing it.
We do have some room for expansion, because the collections that are affiliated with the museum are actually scattered all over campus. This time we’re doing the open house in the natural history building, and the outlying collections are going to put up displays here. Next year it’ll be in this building and in one of the other collections, probably the botany herbarium or the archaeology collection out at Riverbend. Then we’d be open at two places. Eventually I think we can handle probably 500-600 people, or maybe even as many as 1,000.

Columns: You do other public events, too?
Reitz: We participated in Community Insect Week. The entomology collection has participated every year, but this was the first time we invited the public to this building as part of that event.
We are trying to set up some permanent displays at Sandy Creek Nature Center, to augment what they do there. And we’re planning a traveling exhibit in conjunction with Sandy Creek in March-April.

Columns: That will be good experience for the staff here.
Reitz: Yes. We are seeking ways to practice our exhibit skills before we actually have a larger format. Regular professionally designed exhibits cost about $500 a square foot. Really top-notch ones could easily be $1,000 a square foot. You don’t want to make mistakes with that kind of money. Over the next few years, as we move toward a real exhibit facility, we’ll be developing our knowledge and abilities in less expensive ways. We’re also expanding our exhibits on the Web--an increasingly important way we bring the museum to the public.

Columns: How are the plans going for such a facility?
Reitz: Lots of people are talking about it, but there’s a lot of work to be done before we’re ready. We want to build a quality building--to take care of the collections, to make sure research and service can continue, and to add a public face. I think we’re 10 to 15 years away.
If we want to open the building and the exhibits at the same time, we’re starting planning at the right time. Neither the university nor we are ready to build it tomorrow--but we’re moving along.
The most important thing in moving us toward this building is the formation of the Friends of the Museum. All traditional museums have a Friends group, and they’re extremely important.
And now we’re recruiting for a docents’ program. Docents are volunteers--members of the faculty, or students, or retirees, or members of the community--who would be willing to take some training to lead people through the museum. We would like to have the collections open to the public on a drop-in basis at least one day a week.

Columns: The community would be pleased--people like museums.
Reitz: People do. When we were doing the walk-abouts with university administrators, each time I was afraid they would be bored. But we never failed to find a collection that appealed to them. Eventually you discover that they had an arrowhead collection when they were a child, or a bug collection. They grew up and went on to more mature things, but in their heart they still want to talk about that collection.

Columns: I suppose you had to keep pushing them along or they’d stand there forever.
Reitz: Exactly. The open house will let people come in, find their niche and stay there as long as they wish.
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