Syllabus
Museum Administration/Historical Administration
H548 (3 credits)
Tuesday, 6:00pm-8:40pm
Room ES 2108
Professor:
Office:
Office Hours:
Office Telephone:
E-mail:
Melissa Bingmann
CA 504N
Tuesday, 4:30pm-5:30pm and Wednesday, 3:30pm-5:30pm
278-9024
mbingman@iupui.edu
COURSE DESCRIPTION:
This course will present a broad overview of issues that administrators who work in museums,
historical societies, archives, special collection libraries, and other cultural resource agencies
experience in their careers. In this course the term “administrator” applies to both the head of an
organization as well as mid-level managers. In addition to discussions that are unique to
agencies that collect, preserve, and share cultural resources, the class will examine non-profit
leadership trends and management techniques.
COURSE OBJECTIVES:
After the successful completion of this course, students will be able to. . .
 discuss attributes and skills that make an effective non-profit leader.
 assess and apply institutional histories to guide the formation of institutional policy,
procedures, planning, and visioning.
 assess the value of accreditation, communicate the credentials a museum needs for
accreditation, and develop a portion of an accreditation self study.
 identify potential controversial situations, legal issues, and long-term complications of
current policies that can occur in museums and develop strategies for dealing with them.
 identify (and potentially develop) and communicate new models for sustaining museums.
 understand the significance of institutional planning in sustaining a cultural institution.
 demonstrate knowledge of the essential components in developing a strategic plan,
budget, personnel guidelines, and development program.
 assess the financial health of an organization.
POLICIES:
Adaptive Educational Service (AES) AES provides accommodations for students with special
challenges or disabilities that may affect their classroom performance. If you are eligible you
may register with AES by calling 274-3241. Visit http://www.iupui.edu/~sldweb/aes/ for more
information.
Attendance: Attendance is required and will be taken at class meetings.
Academic Integrity and Plagiarism: Academic misconduct and disruptive students may face
disciplinary action according to University policy. Visit http://www.life.iupui.edu/aes/ for more
information.
1
Plagiarism is the violation of academic expectations about using and citing sources. The Indiana
University Code of Student Rights and Responsibilities (available in CA 401) explains
institutional penalties for plagiarism, or you may visit http://www.iupui.edu/code for more
information. These IUPUI policies will be enforced.
Classroom Courtesy
Please arrive on time and turn off cell phones and pagers prior to the beginning of class.
Confidentiality: Speakers often share information that is not intended to be discussed outside of
the classroom. You will also have access to financial information, including salaries, that you
should not widely publicize.
Deadlines
Book reviews are due one week after class discussion:
Bolman and Deal, Reframing Organizations
Jan. 22
Senge, The Fifth Discipline
Feb. 5
Chait, Ryan, Taylor, Governance as Leadership
Feb. 19
Harris, New Solutions for House Museums OR
Falk & Sheppard, Thriving in the Knowledge Age Feb. 26
Guthrie, The New-York Historical Society
March 18
The following projects are due as indicated:
Accreditation report for the Museum of the Emerald City of Oz
Strategic Planning
Feb. 12
Evaluating Financial Health
March 4
AAM Accreditation Self Study Institution Study
Apr. 22
Take home essay question
Apr. 29
Jan. 29
Incompletes
I will be very reluctant to give a grade of Incomplete (I). I assign Incompletes only to students
who have successfully completed most of the course work and who have been prevented by
significant and unanticipated circumstances from finishing all of their assignments.
REQUIRED READINGS:
The following are available for sale in the IUPUI bookstore:
Lee Bolman and Terrence Deal, Reframing Organizations: Artistry, Choice, and Leadership,
second edition, Jossey-Bass, 1997.
Richard P. Chait, William P. Ryan, Barbara E. Taylor, Governance as Leadership:
Reframing the Work of Nonprofit Boards, John Wiley & Sons, 2004.
John Falk and Beverly Sheppard, Thriving in the Knowledge Age: New Models for Museums
and Other Cultural Institutions, AltaMira Press, 2006. OR
Donna Harris, New Solutions for House Museums: Ensuring the Long-Term Preservation of
America’s Historic Houses, AltaMira Press, 2007.
2
Catherine Lewis, The Changing Face of Public History, Northern Illinois Press, 2005.
OR Howard E. Covington Jr., Lady on the Hill: How Biltmore Estate Became an American
Icon, John Wiley & Sons, 2006 (available through Amazon.com)
Peter Senge, The Fifth Discipline, Currency and Doubleday, 1990.
The following is available on reserve at the IUPUI Library:
Kevin Guthrie, The New-York Historical Society: Lessons from One Nonprofit’s Long
Struggle for Survival.
Various articles available on-line through the University Library website, Electronic Course
Reserves.
ASSIGNMENTS:
Book Reviews:
Students will write a 1 to 2 page review of the following five books. Each review needs to
identify the thesis and main supporting arguments as well as draw conclusions about the
relevancy of the reading to historical and museum administration:
Bolman and Deal, Reframing Organizations
Chait, Ryan, Taylor, Governance as Leadership: Reframing the Work of Nonprofit
Boards
Covington, Lady on the Hill OR Lewis, The Changing Face of Public History
Falk and Sheppard, Thriving in the Knowledge Age OR Harris, New Solutions for House
Museums
Guthrie, The New-York Historical Society
Senge, The Fifth Discipline
Projects:
1.
Accreditation Review
Prepare a 3-5 page report to the AAM based on your assessment of a fictional
accreditation proposal submitted by the Museum of the Emerald City of Oz.
2.
Strategic Planning
Review one organization’s strategic plan and assess its current status. Your 3-5
page assessment should include data from annual reports and may include
interviews with staff to determine the plan’s effectiveness.
3.
Evaluating Financial Health
Evaluate (3) I-990s from three institutions to determine financial health. Use
www.guidestar.org for access to I-990s.
3
AAM Accreditation Self-Study
Three groups of students will work together to compose and compile documents for either the
Morris-Butler House, Indiana Medical History Museum, or General Lew Wallace Study and
Museum.
The sections of the Self Study include:
1. Signature page
2. Museum Profile (an overall summary of the operation of the museum
and the home community)
3. Public Trust & Accountability (relationship to the public &
community; ethics policies)
4. Mission, Planning, and Assessing Achievement (mission statement,
strategic planning, self-evaluation systems)
5. Leadership & Organizational Structure (governance, management plans, staff)
6. Collections Stewardship (collections policies, cataloguing,
collections practices)
7. Education & Interpretation (exhibits, tours, educational programming)
8. Financial Stability (budgets, fiscal procedures, donor programs and
policies)
9. Facilities & Risk Management (assessment of public & restricted
areas, emergency procedures, property management)
10. Wrap Up (a summary of various accomplishments of the museum)
11. List of Attachments
Do not worry about #1. The most labor intensive are 3-8 and possibly 9 & 10. Divide sections
accordingly. Your group could consider asking one member to serve as the main contact to the
museum; collect documents required for other members to develop their sections, BTC
requirements, and Accreditation requirements; and complete #2, 10, 11. Depending on the
number of students in your group, you will need to figure out other combinations to
appropriately distribute the workload. Because your group can easily divide the Self Study by
sections, the majority of your grade will be assigned to individuals based on their own work
rather than one grade for the entire group.
Each group will need access to at least one copy of two of the booklets (A Higher Standard:
Museum Accreditation Program Standards and A Higher Standard: Accreditation
Self-Study Questionnaire). Your group might consider jointly purchasing copies of these
publications available through AAM.
Class Participation
Students will be expected to complete the assigned readings prior to class in order to participate
in class discussion.
Your class participation grade will include five points for participating in one or two days of the
field trip to Chicago, a point for every insightful comment made based on the readings, and .5 for
bringing to class the requested document from an institution of your choosing (indicated in the
4
syllabus as BTC). In addition, you will be expected to engage guest speakers in dialogue by
asking well-thought out questions and responding to inquiries posed by speakers. Students are
required to join MUSEUM-L and introduce relevant issues during class discussion. For
questions regarding appropriate use of the internet, consult the Code of Student Rights,
Responsibilities, and Conduct available on-line at http://www.iupui.edu/code. Please be aware
that students are responsible for activity on their computer accounts.
“Bring to Class” (BTC)
In the past, students were required to develop a comprehensive study of a cultural institution or
museum of their choice. This assignment will be replaced with the AAM Accreditation Self
Study, however, I still want each student to choose one institution to study. This institution will
serve as the focus for the strategic planning analysis, financial health assessment, and possibly
your take home final exam. In addition, you will need to ask this institution for certain
documents to bring to class for analysis and discussion. By January 14th, please e-mail me your
choice. When requesting documents, be certain to let staff know the nature of the request and
that you will be sharing the document with students, me, and possibly one or two guest speakers.
Take home final
You will have your choice of writing an eight to ten page essay that addresses innovation in
museums by either 1. answering an inquiry I received from the Indianapolis Star about the
Indiana Historical Society, 2. analyzing the recent expansion and changes at the Chicago History
Museum based on Catherine Lewis’ book The Changing Face of Public History, field trip, and
other documents (if you think you might choose this option, you should choose this as your
institution to study), 3. analyze innovation (or potential risks of traditional approaches) at the
Biltmore Estate based on Harris, New Solutions for House Museums and Lady on the Hill, and
collected documents (if you think you might choose this option, you should choose this as your
institution to study), 4. or analyze any other institution of your choosing to identify innovation
and potential risks association with traditional leadership, management, policies, and
governance. For each selection, you will need to draw on and cite relevant readings from this
class and others, collect data from the institution, and make an argument based on your analysis.
Be creative in the data you collect (i.e. ask to attend a board meeting).
GRADING:
Grades will be weighted in the following manner:
Class participation and attendance
Field trip (5)
Evidence of reading prior to class/BTC (10)
Book Reviews (5)
Projects (3 @ 5 points each)
Accreditation Self-Study
Take home final
GRADE SCALE:
Grades will be based on a 100 point scale as follows:
100-98 = A+
92-97 = A
5
15%
25%
15%
30%
15%
90-91
88-89
82-87
80-81
78-79
72-77
70-71
= A= B+
=B
= B= C+
=C
= C-
SCHEDULE:
*BTC means “Bring to class”
Jan. 8
Introduction
Jan. 15
Museum Accreditation/Team Management Approach/ Reframing
Organizations
Readings : Bohlman and Deal, Reframing Organizations
AAM Accreditation guidelines www.aamus.org/programs/accreditation/accred.cfm? MAP guidelines http://www.aamus.org/programs/map/MAP_overview.cfm;
“Team Management Position Paper,” Historical Resources, Inc., 2007 (available
on Oncourse)
Jan. 22
Strategic Planning/ Heritage Health Index & Emergency Planning
Readings: Sample strategic plans from the California Historical Society (2007),
Rhode Island Historical Society, Indiana Historical Society;
http://www.heritagepreservation.org/HHI/ full report
BTC: emergency plan, conservation plan, other plans discussed in the Heritage
Health Index full report (18 copies); mission statement (18 copies); strategic plan
(2 copies)
Jan. 29
Learning Organizations
Readings: Senge, The Fifth Discipline.
BTC: annual giving solicitation letter (20 copies)
Feb. 5
Fundraising
Readings: Martha Morris, “Expansionism: Success and Failures,” Museum
News, July/August 2004, 30-35; sample annual giving solicitation letters
distributed in class on Jan. 29.
Guest Speaker:
John Vanausdall, Eiteljorg Museum
BTC: Board policies, conflict of interest forms/policies, board orientation
packet, other board-related documents (18 copies)
6
Feb. 12
Trustee responsibility and Board Development
Readings:
Chait, Ryan, Taylor, Governance as Leadership; Skramstad,
“Working Model: A Mechanism for the Effective Board,” Museum News,
January/February 2003, pp. 32-36; Skramstad, “A Conflict’s Resolution,”
Museum News, July/Aug 2004, pp. 25-27.
Feb. 19
New Ideas for Innovative Solutions
Readings: New Solutions for House Museums OR Thriving in the Knowledge
Age
All read: Kykuit Findings, 2007; Durel, “A Golden Age for Historic House
Museums,” History News, 2007.
BTC: I-990 (18 copies)
Feb. 26
Assessing an Institution’s Financial Health/Financial Administration
Readings:
TBA
Guest Speaker:
Michael Dinius, CPA, Noble Consulting
BTC: Annual Report (2 copies)
March 4
Case study: The New-York Historical Society
Reading: Guthrie, The New-York Historical Society: Lessons from One
Nonprofit’s Long Struggle for Survival
March 11
Spring Break
March 18
Museums, Libraries and Public Trust
Readings:
Irvin G. Wylie, “The Search for an American Law of Charity,
1776-1844,” The Mississippi Valley Historical Review, vol. 46, No. 2 sep. 1959,
203-221; J.B. Ames, “The Failure of the ‘Tilden Trust’,” Harvard Law Review,
vol. 5 no. 8, March 15, 1892, 389-402; Robert A. Ferguson, “The Girard Will
Case: Charity and Inheritance in the City of Brotherly Love,” in Philanthropy
and American Society, Center for American Culture Studies, Columbia
University; Howard S. Miller, The Legal Foundations of American Philanthropy,
1776-1844, The State Historical Society of Wisconsin, Madison, 1961, pp. 3-63.
Guest Speaker:
BTC: benefits packages, employee personnel handbook, employment policies,
conflict of interest forms (10 copies) NOTE: I am not sure when we will have
7
time to discuss but please read half of the samples by next week, and all of them
by April 1st.
March 25
Deaccessioning & When to Say “No”
Readings: articles on Museum of Northern Arizona (distributed in class);
Gardner and Merritt, “Collections Planning,” Museum News, July/August, 2002;
draft paper for AASLH on dissolution; Mark S. Gold, “Death By Ethics,”
Museum News, Nov/Dec 2005, 29-31; “When A History Museum Closes,” ethics
position paper #2, AASLH Standing Committee on Standards and Ethics.
Guest Speakers:
Sheila Riley, The Children’s Museum
Marsh Davis, Historic Landmarks of Indiana
BTC: Collecting policies including guidelines for deaccessioning (2)
April 1
More case studies: Biltmore Estate or Chicago History Museum
Readings: Covington, Lady on the Hill OR Lewis, The Changing Face of Public
History; sample personnel material distributed in class on March 18th.
April 8
Grant Writing & Administration
Guest Speakers:
Steve Kennedy and Malia Savarino, Indiana Department of
Historic Preservation and Archaeology
April 15
Small Museums
Guest Speakers:
Jeannie Regan-Dinius, Indiana Department of Natural
Resources Division of Historic Preservation and Archaeology and Cinnamon
Catlin-Legutko, Director, Lew Wallace Museum and Study
April 22
AAM Accreditation Self-Study presentations
April 29
Take-home final
8