Station Eleven - Museum Project Proposal

starting a museum of your own

Before you do this step: be sure that you fully understand the entire project. In this step you are going to show that you read those instructions carefully, and to show that you reallly thought about what sort of museum would preserve some small-but-significant aspect of civilization that can be demonstrated through exhibits, artifacts. You need to understand the limitations of the assignment, and you need to make sure you have a very tight focus and a clear point/thesis/mission statement.

If you are at all unsure, then you want to go back and review The Museum Project and then return here.

ok, so you're back and ready to go

In addition to having carefully explored the assignment requirements, you should also have visited a museum, sent me proof (a selfie will be fine), so that you have a fresh sense of how a museum is set up and how exhibits are presented. You should have thought of several possible museums, sketched out a rough floorplan to think about what your exhibits will be (and why), thought about how you will do a very focused research project on just one special exhibit, and decided what format (Web-based? Paper? Something else?) you want to work with to present the final museum.

what you will turn in (and how)

Before you spend a great deal of time on the research, the invention, the writing, you will need to get a Project Proposal APPROVED by me (yes, I will actually write you back "APPROVED" or not; if not, then you will need to revise it until it is APPROVED. Be sure you check the due date on the Class Schedule.

THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT: I will not accept your final project if you have not had the Project Proposal approved. Then things roll down hill in a very unfortunate way--you will not get a score for this 200-point paper; you will not pass the class.

The proposal itself is not hard, but it does require you to have considered your options, to have thoroughly read and understood the project choices. The (short) proposal will be typed in MLA format, and it will include:

• A project title (it can certainly change)

• An overview of your project as you envision it. What will your museum feature? What is your Mission Statement (purpose of the museum)? How do you see this fitting in with Clark's ideas about what constitutes some important aspect of "Civilization" and human effort? What do you imaigne including in the main collection and why? What do you want to focus on for a special exhibit? How do you plan on submitting the final project (as a website, museum catalogue--not a brochure, a catalogue; they are not the same thing

  Remember to focus your museum (NOT "fashion" (too big) but "changes in American Naval Uniforms," maybe). You need to explain your mission statement so that it is clear what IDEA ABOUT your subject (and it needs to be some signficant aspect of how this collection relates to civilization) you expect your visitors to take away from the experience (NOT "the wide variety of" (too general and pointless) and NOT "really great" (just opinion) but "were changed over time to meet the changing functions expected of different naval ranks," maybe).

• How is your museum differentiated? If it is a museum of Quentin Tarentino movies, why on earth would someone go to your museum rather than just watch the movies or read about them in a book? You need to design something that would entice people to get into a car, drive across town, pay for parking, pay an entry fee (unless you picture a free museum...how will you make money?). One student museum, for example, was focused on Mexican regional cooking. That can be read about in a cook book or eaten at a restaurant, but the student imagined setting up each room as a modest kitchen from one region with characteristic art, stove, utensils, background details. Information on the unique foods of that region (and why certain foods appeared in some states but not elsewhere) was displayed on placards in each room. AND there was sampling (in hopes of getting people to attend the museum cafe) as well as bi-weekly cooking instruction in one region, then another, and so on.

• A clear idea about what your research paper will explore. Remember this is just one room or special exhibit of your entire collection, and you are going to look at this exhibit very closely. The research paper will need a point, a thesis. So a museum of Happy Meals, for example, will have exhibits on the early meals and giveaways, the packaging and marketing with Ronald, the Hamburgler, etc., some quick re-packaging and re-marketing when parents and health groups attacked the meals as unhealthy. But the special exhibit might just be the rise and fall of Disney's involvement with McDonald's (that would be just one room in your museum, and the story of that rise and fall would be what your research paper is going to be about. Your thesis might be something like this: "Realizing that working a marketing deal with McDonald's was a very quick and easy way for Disney to market its own projects, the relationship eventually soured when Disney did not want to be associated with a fast food chain that was under attack for making kids unhealthy."

• The last page of your proposal will be an initial Works Cited page (in current MLA format, so you must use the MLA Works Cited Information you read on Canvas > Files) showing sources that relate to the contents of the special exhibit you want to showcase. You need at least three sources for your research paper, and AT LEAST ONE OF THOSE SOURCES MUST BE A BOOK.

  REMEMBER: short sources are not useful; Wikipedia-type sources are not acceptable; if you can get more than one book on your topic, that's even better.

You will e-mail the Project Proposal as an attched Word (.doc, .docx or .rtf) or .pdf file. Once it is APPROVED! you can go on to the next step.

do not rush this and have it returned to you unapproved; that wastes time

Really think thoroughly about the assignment, the requirements of the whole project that this is a proposal for. Be creative, yes, but also be practical. Do not make this huge; be sure it has a point; be sure you can come up with a research paper with a clear/pointed thesis; be sure this is a place people drive to and pay money to visit rather than just click around for information on the internet. It really is a lot to think about.

you are not alone

Be sure (before you submit a proposal) that you look at the Sample Museum Proposal in the Files section of Canvas.