6 minute read
UNCHARTED TERRITORY
Educators Explore, and Excel, During Pandemic
When our museums and historic sites were suddenly shuttered after COVID-19 spread across the state last spring, silence settled into community spaces that bustled with school field trips and member tours just days before.
This new normal was uncharted territory. The same questions ran through every museum and site educator’s mind. How do our cultural institutions matter now? What do our visitors need from us during these uncertain times?
Immediately, educators throughout the Museum of New Mexico system found themselves busier than ever. They all hit the ground running with quickly but carefully crafted plans—and a few wild new ideas. Museum of International Folk Art director Khristaan Villela summed up their newly intensified role: “Our educators are more important than ever now in this pandemic crisis,” he says. “They are our bridge to the public.”
Bridging the COVID Divide
In a matter of weeks, museums and historic sites were reaching underserved communities statewide, making noise with virtual concerts and lectures, and creating hands-on activities for students who were rapidly turning into Zoom zombies. In several cases, online initiatives that had sat on the back burner for months or even years were thrust into action. Through it all, museum professionals flexed technological skills and climbed steep learning curves. Despite the difficulties of working from home and collaborating from afar, educators across the board are enthusiastic about the innovations that have resulted from the pandemic. For example:
Security guards at the New Mexico History Museum volunteered to assemble learning kits with word searches on notable New Mexico women and a model of a lunar polyhedron.
Museum of International Folk Art educators gathered materials and instructions for students to create beaded animals and necklaces. They also partnered with Santa Fe’s Southside Library to feature folk tales on YouTube recited in Spanish by bilingual educator
Kemely Gomez.
The New Mexico Museum of Art posted Web-based lessons for elementary school kids on artistic techniques of color and line.
New Mexico Historic Sites staff devised a Virtual
Summer Camp highlighting a different daily activity at a different site—including Thursday’s “Glimpse of Life on the Reservation” from Fort Sumner/Bosque
Redondo Memorial and Monday’s lessons on plants of the Chihuahuan Desert from Fort Selden and Taylor
Mesilla sites.
At the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture, Zoom lectures addressed a range of subjects, including Chaco Canyon, San Ildefonso Pueblo’s role in the founding of the Museum of New Mexico, and the future of Bears Ears National Monument.
At the outset, admits former Museum of Indian Arts and Culture outreach and education coordinator Andrew Albertson, no one knew exactly what this educational revolution was going to look like. “We had no idea how long this would last, what people were expecting or anticipating, how other museums were responding,” he says. “I saw that Zoom lectures were being offered and I thought, ‘Well, that’s a good idea, we’ll try that.’ And surely enough, it was popular.”
Working, Virtually
Educators agree that being forced to work out of their respective museums accelerated the implementation of out-of-the-box ideas that have long taken a back seat to other daily priorities of museum business. It also validated the virtual approach as a significant way to engage constituents in New Mexico and around the world. “We kept talking about virtual engagement, but we’d have to focus on our visits and in-person programs,” explains Leslie Fagre, director of education at the Museum of International Folk Art. As the pandemic began, she recalls, “We said, ‘We have to do it. Now’s the time.’” When the pandemic closed the New Mexico Museum of Art, head of education Rebecca Aubin’s small staff had recently finished a two-day retreat with brainstorming sessions about new ways to reach the community. “We already had come up with these ideas to have virtual engagement,” she says. “So when we went into telework for the pandemic, we were charged, we were really inspired. We were ready.” Meanwhile, the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs, which oversees Museum of New Mexico divisions, launched an initiative to bring museum professionals into virtual classrooms. Museum of Indian Arts and Culture deputy director Matthew Martinez virtually walked classes through the museum’s exhibition of the poppy graphic art of Diego Romero. At-home students learned how the artist’s narrative work reflects his Cochiti Pueblo identity. New Mexico History Museum educator Melanie LaBorwit spoke to first-graders in Roswell and seventhgraders in Albuquerque’s East Mountains. “I was virtually all over the state!” LaBorwit marvels. “It was heartwarming, because I got to see kids. The teachers were harried, but they were so grateful.”
Museum of International Folk Art bilingual educator Kemely Gomez reads a book in Spanish on the museum’s YouTube channel. The program is in partnership with the Santa Fe Southside Library. Photo courtesy Kemely Gomez.
While the pandemic constricted many opportunities for in-person community engagement, it also expanded the social outreach and impact of the museums and historic sites.
When the Santa Fe Community Educators Network— a consortium of school, museum and nonprofit professionals—put out the call for hands-on activities to distribute at grab-and-go school lunch sites around Santa Fe County, educators answered. Even as the pandemic shut down schools in April and May, the folk art museum put together 1,500 craft-making kits for children.
“I love that these kits are a physical alternative to all the screen time kids have to do with schooling at home,” Fagre says. “It’s something to do with their hands, something physical and tangible that they can be creative with at home.”
Student summer school initiatives benefited, too. Los Luceros Historic Site assembled take-home activities called Stories from the Land. Distributed at libraries in Embudo and Ohkay Owingeh Pueblo, as well as Moving Arts Española, these included student writing prompts on themes such as nature, history and science fiction. The Museum of International Folk Art sent out 200 kits statewide with materials and instructions to make koinobori, or Japanese fish kites. The Museum of Art focused on its collection, using their website to spotlight virtual explorations of the museum’s basement archives and library. This enabled an online exhibition on Zozobra creator and artist Will Shuster. “We have 37 boxes of Will Shuster’s stuff,” Aubin says. “That’s exciting to show it to people.”
Funding an Unknown Future
In their newly expansive roles, educators are excited to see their museums snaking their way into new education and social networks. And while the future is unknown, it’s clear that virtual and distance learning programs— which are funded by private support—are here to stay. “We are the deliverers of information,” Aubin says. “We’re more appreciated than we have been in the past.” Fagre at the folk art museum adds, “We had been wondering how we can serve an international audience better, people who can never come to the museum. We started on a strategic plan about a year ago, and one of the big goals was to increase our digital presence. And suddenly here it is. It’s a really important part of our mission now.”
After seeing how the history museum has increased its reach to students from Alamogordo to Santa Fe, LaBorwit
The New Mexico Museum of Art posted online art activities for children focusing on color and line. Photo © Cheron Bayna.
can’t wait to see what new opportunities will arrive in the fall. With donor support for everything from virtual technology to materials for hands-on art making kits, these and other innovative initiatives throughout the museum system will continue to serve communities and schoolchildren near and far.
“I’m looking forward to opening doors—or windows, if you will—to engage online with classrooms around the state,” LaBorwit says. “We’ve all learned new skills, and I think we can impact those communities that we haven’t reached before.”
