TESTING THE INSIDE-OUT MODEL OF A NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM

Natural history museums and science centers are considered trustworthy places where the public can find reliable and authentic information. Visitor surveys show that they come to museums to learn, to be entertained, and to share these experiences with family and friends. All natural history museums seek to increase visitorship, augment the visitor experience, and remain relevant and place-centered. The Burke Museum, the Washington State Museum of Natural History and Culture, is intimately tied to the university, and collections are largely the result of research projects. Including museum visitors in aspects of research projects provides object-based learning and a sense of ownership. The Burke is now in a multi-year transformation process that will allow visitors to see and interact with the museum's collections on a broad scale (60% of the collections will be visible, 2% are today). In this setting, visitors will see the work of an active research museum and have the opportunity to connect the experience to their own lives through activities and interaction with staff. We are turning the museum inside out.

Here we present one case study of an uncomplicated outreach component of testing the inside-out model. We set up a foraminiferal picking station in the lobby, staffed by students and volunteers. This activity is part of a research project for evaluating and monitoring the health of the Puget Sound ecosystems utilizing benthic foraminifera. Visitors to the station were not surprised that Puget Sound is polluted, but they were surprised to learn that microbiota can be so informative. The Puget Sound estuary is severely impacted by human development and hosts many Superfund sites. In collaboration with the State Department of Ecology, the Burke is assessing the benthic environments and the impacts of mitigation efforts in the Sound. This case-study exercise was deigned to engage the museum visitors and to illustrate that collections-based research projects directly address environmental degradation in their own backyard. Based on the philosophy that an informed populace will be more willing to embrace but good environmental practices and also to initiate their own. We hope that the visitor will leave the museum with an action-oriented step.