Yorkshire museum partnership opportunity

 

 7th August 2017

 In News And Opportunities

Deadline: 23:59 on 20th August

Culture Syndicates CIC and Museum Development Yorkshire are seeking partners for a major new regional initiative, Effective Museum Collections.

We are currently fundraising for this project, which will be delivered during 2018-20.

This innovative project will focus on underused and ‘inaccessible’ museum objects held by a number of museums in Yorkshire. A cohort of trainees will work with partner museums to review their collections and support them to realise their potential, with a particular focus on rationalisation.

We are seeking partner museums to participate at a variety of levels:

Core partners

Up to six core partner museums will each host a funded trainee working four days per week for one year. Each partner museum will manage its trainee to develop and work through a collection review and rationalisation plan with expert guidance from Museum Development Yorkshire, Culture Syndicates and relevant specialists.

Additional partners

We are also seeking approximately four additional partners to support the project and host training projects.  The trainees will be supervised by Culture Syndicates’ specialists to solve collections management challenges as a team.

 Benefits to participating

• Your museum will receive access to a supported trainee to work alongside your staff for up to a year
• Your museum’s collection will be better managed and interpreted through the significant staff time and budget provided by the project, expert partners and trainees
• Your organisation will be part of a partnership group, sharing information and collectively improving operation and management practice for more efficient working
• Your organisation will be supported to trial new ways of working, including community engagement for diverse recruiting, improving workforce diversity and community involvement

 

“Resilience Syndicate [the pilot for Effective Collections Traineeship] provided the museum with a unique opportunity to build capacity. It has stepped into action valuable projects, allowing business development needs to be advanced, which would not have been achievable without this support. The opportunity to work alongside other partner museums has provided a valuable support network for discussion of projects and exploring fresh and alternative ways of working.”

Eleanor Baumber, Museum Manager at British Horological Institute Museum

 Expected commitment

A theme of sharing runs throughout the project; this co-production approach will ensure that trainees are empowered to design activity plans that help your museum build resilience. Partners will identify common issues that the trainees can tackle at sharing events and through mentoring and consultation sessions with Museum Development Yorkshire and Culture Syndicates. This is expected to be 3 halfday group meetings within Yorkshire, two consultation meetings at your site plus telephone support as needed.

Each core partner will manage their trainee on a day to day basis. Support can be provided to partners without HR procedures or who do not yet have employees.

Partners will be expected to contribute between £1,000 and £5,000 at the beginning of the project, dependent on the scale of organisation and level of involvement. This investment will see a return of £120,000* worth of support between the partner museums as part of a project budget of over £200,000*.

*Exact figure yet to be finalised but is likely to increase

Schedule

We need to determine the level of demand and interest by regional museums to our potential funders.  To do this we would like you to complete a non-binding expression of interest.  The timescales at this feasibility stage are tight, as a result we have outlined the timetable below:

Deadline to return expression of interest form: 20th August 2017

Stage 1 (development): expected December 2018 to December 2019

Stage 2 (delivery, including trainee employment): expected January 2019 to September 2020

 Who can express an interest?

This is an opportunity for museums and arts organisations of all sizes. Your museum must be:

• Able to commit to reviewing one or more of its collections and open to exploring rationalisation and disposal
• An Accredited Museum or formally recognised as ‘Working Towards Accreditation’
• A museum in the Yorkshire and Humber region

 

Please get in touch if you would like to talk with us about this opportunity.  If your museum is unable to host a trainee, there might be other ways of involving you in this project.

Who will employ and manage trainees?

In Stage 1 of the project, we will research whether partners are able to directly employ a trainee or if we need to employ them on your behalf.

What happens after I express an interest?

We will contact you to discuss the project and your needs further. We are submitting our funding bid by 5th September and aim to have several potential partners identified by this date.

Interested? Click below to complete an expression of interest

https://www.snapsurveys.com/wh/s.asp?k=150176634737 

 

For an informal discussion, please contact Dieter Hopkin (dieter.hopkin@ymt.org.uk)