Collections care encompasses museum-wide activities that require an understanding of the factors that cause deterioration and the actions that can slow the rate of deterioration and prevent damage. This course provides the foundational preservation knowledge necessary to care for museum, library, and archive collections. Course topics include:

• Developing a community of practice in collections care
• Culturally sensitive stewardship
• Hazardous materials in collections
• Agents of deterioration
• Mitigation of the agents of deterioration
• Archival materials
• Preventive care and exhibits
• Care of organic objects (e.g., textiles, paper, keratin and collagen-based materials)
• Care of inorganic objects (e.g., metals, glass, ceramics, stone, bone, antler, ivory)

This four week course uses a blended learning format. The class meets synchronously two hours per week via video conferencing, along with asynchronous discussions, readings, and hands-on activities to be completed each week. Participants build community through small group activities during synchronous class, online discussions, and virtual gatherings. Live sessions will be held on Thursdays from 3:00-5:00 pm CST.

The course fee includes all course materials, shipping, and Center for Collections Care swag. Hands-on kits and instructions are mailed to participants before the start of class. Hands-on kits and interactives include:

• Archival materials kit
• Light fading kit
• IPM monitoring kit
• Calcium carbonate polishing kit
• Fiber Identification kit

This class is part of a two-part beginner-level series that serves as a gateway to more advanced hands-on conservation courses. The other segment of this series, Fundamentals of Collections Management is offered annually. These courses need not be taken in sequence.

Christa Deacy-Quinn is the Collections Manager at the University of Illinois Spurlock Museum where she has managed collections care and preservation, artifact storage, packaging, transport, as well as exhibit design and installation since 1991. Christa holds a M.A. in Anthropology from the University of Illinois and a B.A. in Anthropology and Museum Studies from SUNY-Oswego. In addition, she teaches museum collection preservation at the University of Illinois, serves as a faculty associate of Ontario’s Willowbank School of Restoration Arts, and is a peer reviewer for the Museum Assessment Program for the American Alliance of Museums. Christa is author of FUNdamentals of Museum IPM, accessible for free download.

Do you need more money to properly care for your collections? Who doesn’t? Fundraising and grant writing are essential tools to improve your collections stewardship. In this class, experts in fundraising and grant writing for the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) and the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) will share their knowledge and practical tips to help your organization become grant-ready and to prepare successful and realistic project proposals, work plans, and budgets. Participants will learn how to identify foundations and federal grant opportunities that address their organization’s preservation and access needs and how to develop competitive proposals. Additionally, participants will learn how to think creatively about alternative sources for funding preservation and access as not all projects merit the time and effort required for grant support. Participants are encouraged to come prepared to discuss and develop a collections care or access project.

This four-week course uses a blended learning format of synchronous and asynchronous learning. We will meet synchronously two hours per week via video conferencing, along with asynchronous discussions, readings, and activities to be completed each week. Live meetings will be on Wednesday of each week between 12-2pm CST. Participants will build a community of practice through small group activities during synchronous sessions, online discussions, and virtual gatherings.

After completing this course participants will:

• Understand what it means to be grant-ready and why that matters
• Know how national initiatives for collections care can contribute to grant-readiness
• Be able to identify fundraising and federal funding opportunities that address preservation and access needs
• Understand what logic models are and why and how they are used
• Know how to write letters of intent to foundations
• Know how to develop a project methodology based on professional standards and best practice
• Know how to develop a realistic work plan and project budget
• Know how to develop an evaluation plan for preservation and access projects
• Gain proposal writing strategies and helpful hints
• Understand how to navigate grants.gov, the grant review process, and grants management
• Collaborate with a community of colleagues to build lasting professional networks

A “history geek” since elementary school, Bob Beatty is President of the Lyndhurst Group, a community-focused history, museum, and nonprofit consulting firm providing engagement strategies for institutional planning, organizational assessments, and interpretive direction. From 2007-2017 Bob served the American Association for State & Local History, most recently as Chief of Engagement, but also Interim President & CEO and Chief Operating Officer. From 1999-2007 he directed the Education Department at the Orange County (FL) Regional History Center.

He graduated with a B.A. in Liberal Studies and an M.A. in History from the University of Central Florida. He holds a Ph.D. in Public History from Middle Tennessee State University, his dissertation, “You Wanna Play in My Band, You Better Come to Pick,” discusses the influence of Floridian Duane Allman and the Allman Brothers Band on American music. He is also an instructor of Museum Studies and American History at the graduate and undergraduate levels.

Jennifer Hain Teper serves as the Velde Preservation Librarian at the University of Illinois Libraries overseeing conservation, collections care, digital preservation, and the digitization services throughout the library system. She previously served as the head of conservation at the University of Illinois libraries from 2001-2008. Jennifer graduated from the University of Texas at Austin with an MLIS and Certificate of Advanced Study in the Conservation and Preservation of Library and Archival Materials. She teaches several preservation and conservation courses in the Graduate School of Information Science at the University of Illinois. She is a Fellow of the American Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works, where she serves as the Chair of the Equity and Inclusion Working Group.

Collections management is everything that is done to preserve, develop, and make collections accessible for use. Preservation principles are covered in Fundamentals of Collections Care. Fundamentals of Collections Management takes as its focus a basic introduction to the development of and access to collection. Development encompasses acquisition, legal and ethical issues, policy, planning, and relevance to mission and access refers to both intellectual and physical accessibility. Intellectual accessibility is how we make associated data about collections available. Physical accessibility involves access in storage and management of the different ways collections are physically used and the information that results from that usage (i.e., loans, exhibits, publications, cultural use, research, destructive testing, and educational programs, etc.).

Course topics include:

• Developing a community of practice in collections management
• Principles of collections stewardship
• Benchmarks to meet national standards
• Value of collections to mission and stakeholders
• Collections management policy and plans
• Acquisition and accession criteria and processes
• Deaccession criteria and disposal
• Manual and electronic documentation systems
• Condition reporting (hands-on kit provided!)
• Labeling objects (hands-on kit provided!)
• Legal and ethical issues impacting acquisition, deaccession,and use

This four week course uses a blended learning format. The class meets synchronously two hours per week via video conferencing, along with asynchronous discussions, readings, and hands-on activities. Participants build community through small group activities during synchronous class, online discussions, and virtual gatherings. Live sessions will be held on Thursdays from 3:00-5:00 pm CST.

The course fee includes course materials, shipping, and Center for Collections Care swag. Two hands-on kits and instructions will be mailed to participants before the start of class.

This class is part of a two-part beginner-level series that serves as a gateway to more advanced hands-on conservation courses. The other segment of this series, Fundamentals of Collections Care is offered annually. These courses need not be taken in sequence.

Christa Deacy-Quinn is the Collections Manager at the University of Illinois Spurlock Museum where she has managed collections care and preservation, artifact storage, packaging, transport, as well as exhibit design and installation since 1991. Christa holds a M.A. in Anthropology from the University of Illinois and a B.A. in Anthropology and Museum Studies from SUNY-Oswego. In addition, she teaches museum collection preservation at the University of Illinois, serves as a faculty associate of Ontario’s Willowbank School of Restoration Arts, and is a peer reviewer for the Museum Assessment Program for the American Alliance of Museums. Christa is author of FUNdamentals of Museum IPM, accessible for free download.