Adult Museum Programs: Designing Meaningful Experiences

Bonnie Sachatello-Sawyer and her co-authors have taken an important study and turned it into an intriguing, readable, and practical book. Adult learners provide a unique opportunity for museum educators. But what are adult learners looking for? What motivates them to take a class or attend a museum-sponsored activity? What do planners and instructors need to know to maximize the experience for participants? The authors analyzed a wide variety of programs from the perspective of planners, instructors, and participants. They discovered what works and what doesn't, and they've distilled this knowledge into twelve basic steps you can use to design truly meaningful experiences for your museum's adult programs. Visit the authors' web page

Museum program planners and visitor studies professionals should turn their attention to this milestone book.... Adult Museum Programs: Designing Meaningful Experiences is an important addition to the visitor-studies literature.... The integration of adult-education and visitor-studies theory, illustrated with the rich description of real participant experiences, provides a useful and readable resource for adult program planners, museum evaluators and informal-learning researchers....it is a notable addition to the literature of museum education and a well deserving addition to your professional library. (Carey Tisdal, St. Louis Science Center Visitor Studies Today!)

This volume recognizes that while younger students are often the target audience for museum programs, adult learners constitute a unique audience and offer a unique opportunity for most museums. (Utah Historical Quarterly, Vol. 71, No.4, Fall 2003)

....a 'how-to' manual with abundant case studies and one whose insights into teaching and learning has relevance for educators in any number of situations and venues. (Mary Munsell Abroe, Kendall College, Evanston, Illinois Journal Of The Illinois State Historical Society)

...Adult Museum Programs is a valuable book for students of museum education, and for public program and education staff undertaking strategic planning. (Ann Baillie Museums Australia Magazine, Vol. 12/4, May 2004)

The authors have produced an excellent resource for planners by focusing on the knowledge and skills required to run an adult learning program. They use illustrative case studies based on interviews and observation in describing successful programs that range from lectures and guided tours to field trips and teacher workshops, offering useful tips on how to organize and implement each type of experience. Detailed check-lists will be particularly valuable to new professionals and volunteer facilitators. (Katharine T. Corbett The Public Historian, Spring 2004, Vol. 26, Number 2)

Unlike many museum education books, this one refrains from philosophising on the 'why' and goes hell for leather on the 'how'! It acknowledges that adult museum programmes are money spinners and yet asks musuem educators to aspire to programmes with values higher than profit. (Liz Coman, National Gallery of Ireland Museum Ireland)