How Has It Changed?

My project has not really changed, however you can say the research idea has expanded. When I first began the research for my thesis, I only had a general idea of what I wanted to do. As the semester went on, I decided to hone in more on my research and create a specific idea for my research. I know now I want to focus on Mental Health in New York-based schools specifically.

I see it evolving to maybe focusing on a specific grade in the school, based on curriculum already written by New York. I hope to create a lesson plan based around a specific mental health issue and be able to create awareness for students in the school. I know I still want to connect with schools in the Rochester area and be sure to work with them and know what they are already doing now for the mental health of their students.

It's a Topic!

Research Question: 

How can the education system improve their programs surrounding the mental health of their students? 

Changing the stigma surrounding mental illness is a very important issue that our society is facing today. I believe it is important to start the conversation anywhere you can. 

            So, for my thesis, I will be focusing on the programs that the secondary education system, specifically in New York state, has in motion now to improve the mental health of their students. 

My research will see what resources if any, schools have in place for their students to use when it comes to their mental health. I will also focus on what is required by New York State’s Board of Education when it comes to teaching about mental health. I want to know when schools implement these requirements into their curriculum, and how they go about it. I think it’d be interesting to see if the schools do the bare minimum of what is required or if they go above and beyond. However, I think it will also be important to see how access to resources, funding, and location of the school affects how they tackle this problem and ways the state can improve this.

            I also would like to research what students think of what the school is doing by surveying classes in multiple schools about the topic of mental health and see the baseline of what they know, what the school has taught them, and if the school itself helps them in a way they feel is adequate. I do not think my research would be complete without student’s opinions who actually attend New York schools and experience what they have to offer. What they have to say about how they believe their school could improve is extremely significant to my research because the point of my work is to succor them. 
          At the end of my research, I hope to create a curriculum or public program that can be implemented in schools or other educational institutions aimed at these students that help educate on mental illness, and ways to improve how schools handle the conversation and education on mental health. 

Who...knows?

Hello all!

Picking a thesis idea has been haunting me since freshman year. Since starting my journey in the museum studies field, I could not pinpoint an area where I was die-hard interested in. This alone made me nervous when it came to thesis, because I wanted to be sure I was passionate about whatever I was writing about. Over the last four years my interests have changed and evolved, and I decided I wanted to move past the museum field after graduation and focus my professional journey in education. 

So for my thesis project, I’m going to take the public history route to focus on the education system and their relationship to mental health initiatives. I’d focus on grades 9-12 for this thesis. I do not know whether or not I want to do a project-based thesis, or solely focus on the research.

If I were to a more project-based thesis, I’d want to focus on maybe creating a curriculum / program schools could follow to help improve their mental health initiatives for their students. If I did research, I’d mostly write about what their doing and how they could improve upon it. 

Not only do I have to research about what they are doing now in schools, I also have to research a lot about psychology and mental health disorders that affect people around the world.

I know I want to at least start by surveying highschools in the area of Rochester to see what they are doing, and what they think they can improve in regards to their mental health and wellness programs they have in place

This is it!

Hello, my name is Grace Gallagher. I’m a fourth year Museum Studies major, however, I plan on going into secondary education with a focus in history after I graduate. My interests really focus in on education and history, but when it comes to museums I do enjoy learning about visitor engagement. I spent my summer as a Camp Leader in a Summer Recreation Camp aimed at pre-kindergarten students. I also currently work at before and after school programs for K-5th graders. In my free-time I like to read books in all different genres, binge Netflix, spend way too much time with my friends, and collect as many postcards as possible. 

When it comes to my experience in museums, I’ve only ever experienced them as a visitor. Recently I went to the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, experiencing the various exhibitions they had. When it comes to my visitor type in museums it is not what you expect from a museum studies major. I am one of those people that just like to walk through and learn by just looking and enjoying the space and people around me, I am definitely not one to read the labels. Eventually I hope to get an internship in a public history based setting! 

Source: TimeOut

Blog post 1: a final beginning

Hello! I'm Taylor, and like almost everyone else in this class, I'm starting my final year of my Museum Studies degree at RIT. The past three years have absolutely flown by, and I find myself oscillating between excitement and terror, proud of what I've accomplished thus far, anxious about my future. I think that's fairly typical of any big life change though, and what could be more life changing than writing the longest paper I've written in my life just to top off my college experience?

Over the past three years I've been incredibly fortunate to have lots of different job experiences in the museum field. My first two internships were in archives, sorting, labeling, and boxing hundreds of cameras and Kodak paraphernalia on Ridge Road. During the school year I also worked at the RIT Archives, and at Paley Studios, however my favorite position I've held has to be the internship I had in the programming department of the MIT Museum this summer. Prior to the internship, I'd been leaning towards the public-facing side of institutions more than the archives, but this summer confirmed all those hypotheses I had been making about my future. Helping kids discover how to make a paper circuit, dreaming up events and then bringing them to life, just interacting with visitors daily - all these things made my summer great! Here's some photos from my whirlwind summer:

Cup towers - an architectural challenge!

These men were in Cambridge from Paris for a conference at Harvard, they're all PhD candidates, but that didn't stop them from playing with some toothpicks and gumdrops.

Catherine, me, and our boss, Jenny.

The interns! (Tara, Catherine, Me)

This semester I'm looking forward to exploring programs and how they can enhance a visitor's experience, as well as how those in charge of programs can help the museum to reach a larger audience. I can't wait to go through the year with everyone else in the class and to watch all of your theses grow and develop! Good luck with week 2 my friends!

Printing Press Thesis Evolution

My thesis has evolved significantly over the last three months. Originally, I had just a rather vague idea of a potential thesis idea - I wanted to utilize my work as part of the Uncommon Press team to approach the subject of a reconstructed printing press from a museum studies perspective. Since then, it has gone through a few iterations. I next thought that I’d focus on the way in which such a press, being held by a cultural institution, could be utilized by a local school as an educational object. As I’ve done more scholarly research & discussed the project with my primary adviser, Dr. Decker, my thesis has changed to its current version, which is to analyze three educational methods utilized by museums, objected-based, interactive-based, and interpreter-based, and to formulate an educational procedure or plan which utilizes the press in a way that offers maximum learning potential for visitors.

Hannah, an interpreter from Edes & Gill, a colonial printing shop experience in Boston, MA, speaking to visitors
while Seth holds up a freshly printed copy of the Declaration of Independence.

As I continue to work on my thesis, I certainly expect it will continue to change, but likely in more subtle ways. Since our thesis proposal is due in a week, it would obviously be best if my focus stayed primarily on the press in relation to the educational methods that I mentioned above. It's quite possible, however, that my ongoing research into scholarly writings on museum education will mean that another useful educational method will become apparent. If that happens, I'll likely incorporate it into my thesis, since my goal is to create the most successful educational plan possible. I mentioned this in our last class, but just over a week ago, we brought back nearly all of the wooden parts of the press from our custom woodworker in Harrisburg, PA, after spending the day working on finishing up a variety of smaller details. We're actively working on getting all of the metal pieces ready, but it's still looking rather impressive.

A sped up video of Seth interacting with the reconstructed press at Edes & Gill, 

and getting to personally print out a copy of the Declaration of Independence.

I mentioned this in our last class, but just over a week ago, we brought back nearly all of the wooden parts of the press from our custom woodworker in Harrisburg, PA, after spending the day working on finishing up a variety of smaller details. We're actively working on getting all of the metal pieces ready, but it's still looking rather impressive.

The press as it currently stands, with virtually all of the wooden parts complete & in place. 

Potential topic

Since I want to explore a career in Museum Education, I think I’ll write my thesis about a topic related to the field. Specifically, I want to focus on adult learning in nonformal environments. I wrote a paper for Dr. Lent's class about the same subject, and I want to examine it further. 

There is a definite gap of academic research focusing specifically on adult education in museums—most of what I found was about children and school groups. To narrow my topic further, I think I’ll write about a specific underrepresented adult demographic, like seniors or adults without college educations. Museums claim to be centers for lifelong learning, so the academic research should reflect that. Seniors and retirees make up a large part of museum visitors, members, and volunteers, yet I can't find much about how to accommodate their educational needs. I'd be interested in a project that addresses this issue.

Thesis Topic

As I discussed in my post from early September, I've been working with a team of mechanical engineers on the Uncommon Press project, which will culminate in the creation of an English common press for the Cary Graphic Arts Collection. I have decided that I will use my experience and participation in this project as a starting point for my senior thesis. More specifically, I plan to focus on the way in which the finished press can be utilized by individuals outside of the RIT and printing communities. The idea to hone in on this area arose through conversations with various individuals, including Dr. Decker; I've been asked multiple times, "what's the end goal for this project? Is it just to have a wooden press in the Cary's collection? Will it be accessible to the general public?" I think these are important question, which deserve to be answered.

One could certainly reason that creating the press just to say you have one is an expensive and largely unnecessary endeavor. Since wooden common presses, whether they're originals or reconstructions, are quite rare, I would counter that there certainly is value in creating it so that it can be placed alongside newer, cast iron presses in the Cary. Still, that might not seem like a sufficient reason, so I plan to dig deeper, and provide at least one answer to the question: "How can a reconstruction of an English Common Press be used to benefit the public?" Currently, my brief answer would be to say that the press could be used as an educational object for students, likely those in middle school. To support my answer to this question, I plan to utilize historical data & publications related to the subject of the English common press, current scholarly reports and articles relating to education, information gleaned from the curriculum of a local school & interviews with its teachers, and my own knowledge gained from personally working on the project. It's my hope that through researching & writing my thesis, I will be able to come up with a formula through which a variety of schools could utilize any reconstruction of a common press as a contextual device to better educate their students.