Students in Fleming College’s Museum Management and Curatorship program are putting months of classroom learning into practice with a new exhibit at the Peterborough Museum and Archives.
“We Wear Many Hats,” now on display, officially opened April 16th with speeches and refreshments, it was designed and produced entirely by students, drawing on skills developed across two academic semesters and will remain open until June 14th.
Program coordinator Amy Barron says the project is meant to simulate real-world museum work from concept to completion.
Barron says students were responsible for every aspect of the exhibit, including research, design and installation, mirroring the demands of professional museum roles.
Student of the program, Claire Frenette talks about her experience in the program.
The exhibit was an eight-month long period that highlights the breadth of skills required in the museum field, where each and every student often had to take on multiple roles, a theme reflected in the exhibits title.
Frenette says the hands-on experience has helped bridge the gap between theory and practice as they prepare to enter the workforce and taught her many lessons including what not to do in the field.
With the exhibit now open to the public, which was completely designed, planned, and built by the students in the program.
In the coming months, students will head out to internships across Canada, where they will apply their skills in professional museum settings after all the time they spent not only building this exhibit but also building lifelong professional relationships with their professors and colleagues.
(Written by: Branden Rushton)
