Change Is Required by Avi Y Decter

Change Is Required by Avi Y Decter

Change is Required: Preparing for the Post-Pandemic Museum is a book about the future of American museums. Like other institutions, museums and zoos, historic sites, gardens, and arboreta, were powerfully affected by the nested crises of the pandemic. These unprecedented crises challenged American museums. Adapting to novel circumstances and uncertainty became the order of the day; improvisation in policy and practice the new norm.
Amidst upheavals and disruptions, a number of American museums have charted new directions for themselves and their communities. Many museums have taken a decisive turn to digital programming. Others have taken a turn toward community, developing new kinds of collaborations with their neighbors and local audiences. Still others have moved issues of equity and justice—internally and in the world—to the center of their institutional concerns.
In every part of the country—and in every type of museum--museum workers are challenging old assumptions, conventional narratives, and customary practices as they look to the future. In Change Is Required, a unique array of 50 museum professionals--representing different disciplines, positions, and experiences--share their thinking about assessing needs and possibilities, managing people and resources, and building productive new relationships with neighbors, communities, and partner organizations.
These authors argue that change is necessary--inside and beyond the museum. It is futile and unproductive to default to the old “normal.” To achieve greater relevance, impact, equity, and inclusiveness, museums need to reconsider their leadership models, organizational culture, internal structures, and community collaborations Bristling with personal passion, informed by experience, and focused on the future, the essays in this volume convey the urgency to rethink traditional museum practice, offering visionary—yet practical—routes to future museum success in a volatile, complex, and ambiguous world.
In its depth and range, this book constitutes an invitation to join in the growing, lively discourse about possible futures for museums in America. The invitation extends not only to museum professionals, but to all those interested in cultural affairs and institutions.

Some of the most insightful and forward-thinking people in the museum field weigh in on this moment…How we got here, what it says about our field, and what opportunities it presents for long-overdue change. We need this book. -- Sean Kelley, Senior Vice President, Director of Interpretation Eastern State Penitentiary Historic Site
A remarkable exploration on the future of museums that contains powerful responses to the challenges we're facing, reflections on past and potential practices, and calls to action that offer the possibility for change. -- Joe Imholte, Executive Vice President, The Bakken Museum
This book is a must-read if you or your museum is grappling with how to remain relevant to the broader community, to enhance visitor numbers, and/or to deal with the role of technology and virtual learning. If you are not considering these issues, then it is an even more important read. -- Dennis Schatz, Senior Fellow , Institute for Learning Innovation, and Senior Advisor Emeritus, Pacific Science Center
This volume of collected essays is an immensely valuable gift to museum professionals. It is a banquet of possibilities offered by people willing to share their experiences of one of the most difficult times through which we as humans and professionals have ever lived. But as with any memorable banquet, I advise readers to approach the feast with small plates filled with only enough that can be digested in a single sitting to fuel their courage to embrace uncertainty, inspire adaptive leadership skills, and spark hope for transformation as we grow to embrace lessons learned during the pandemic and how they will shape the future of museums. -- Erika Sanger, Executive Director, Museum Association of New York

Avi Decter, Managing Partner of History Now, is known for interpreting difficult subjects, including labor unrest at the Boott Cotton Mill Museum in Lowell, MA; civil war at the National Civil War Museum in Harrisburg, PA; and genocide at United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Over the years, he has helped to plan new museums in six states and the District of Columbia. Decter is the author of Interpreting American Jewish History at Museums and Historic Sites (2016) and Exploring American Jewish History through 50 Historic Treasures (forthcoming). With Ken Yellis, he writes the "History in Progress" column for History News.
Marsha Semmel is an independent consultant working with cultural and educational organizations on leadership development, strategic planning, and partnerships. In 2019, she published Partnership Power: Essential Museum Strategies for Today’s Networked World. Semmel has served as Senior Advisor to the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), the National Center for Science and Civic Engagement, and the Noyce Leadership Institute. She has taught at the Bank Street College Graduate program in museum education since 2015. Previously, Semmel served in leadership roles at the Institute of Museum and Library Services and NEH. She has been President/CEO of Conner Prairie, in Indiana, and Women of the West Museum in Denver.
Ken Yellis, Principal of Project Development Services, served as guest curator for Passages through the Fire: American Jews and the Civil War. A historian with four decades in the museum field, Ken has been involved in over 100 history, science, and art exhibitions. Ken served as grant writer and content developer for The Brooklyn Navy Yard: Past, Present and Future (2009-2011). He has worked for the Touro Synagogue Foundation, the International Tennis Hall of Fame, the Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History, Plimoth Plantation, and the National Portrait Gallery.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9781538161654
ISBN 10	1538161656
Title	Change Is Required
Author	Avi Y Decter
Series	American Association For State And Local History
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Hardback
Publisher	Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Year published	2022-09-01
Number of pages	308
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.