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Renae Youngs – Evaluating Organizations’ Impact on Communities (Alumni Spotlight)

Renae facilitating a workshop for the Forum of Regional Arts Councils of Minnesota. Credit: Advance Marketing Services, Inc
Renae facilitating a workshop for the Forum of Regional Arts Councils of Minnesota. Credit: Advance Marketing Services, Inc

Renae decided to pursue a Museology degree at UW because she saw the value in its interdisciplinary nature. When she joined the program in 2009, she was drawn to the program’s interdisciplinary nature and its focus on how museums serve their communities. “It was very explicit in being focused on museums as institutions that play a role in their communities, and are there to serve people and communities. Those were things that were appealing to me and how I viewed museums,” she said. “It was not common rhetoric, even on the professional side of the field, [which] was not yet talking about advocacy or community in the way that it is now.”

Museology strengthened her conviction to pursue these aspects of museum practice, while also giving her the intellectual underpinnings to become a successful museum professional. Renae participated in the New Directions program as a student, which has since become Museology’s Museum Evaluation specialization. Her thesis work on emerging practices for use of evaluation findings focused on how to ensure that museum practitioners are best-equipped to incorporate the results of evaluation into their work.

Since graduating, Renae has worked in various consulting, research and evaluation roles. Her first job out of Museology was a Research Associate position at the Institute for Learning Innovation, based at COSI (Center of Science and Industry) in Columbus, Ohio, where she served as part-consultant, part in-house team member. In 2014, she became the Director of Research & Evaluation for the Minnesota State Arts Board, where she supports grant applicants to better document and understand the outcomes of their work. For Renae, the Museology program gave her “a lot of credibility as a ‘museum person,’ even though a lot of the work I have done since is not traditional, core museum work.” She has found that Museology helped to make her conversant in many areas of museum practice. This has helped her in the variety of projects she worked on in her visitor studies consulting work, as well as in her current job working with a wide variety of cultural organizations, although she says she has to “work much harder to have a shared understanding and vocabulary with the non-museum people I’m working with.” In the Museology program, she was able to learn from peers about other areas of museum practice, which helped her establish a common vocabulary with lots of museum professionals and learn to translate evaluation across different areas of expertise.

Renae has developed a personal and professional network from her time in Museology, through her peers and meeting other museum professionals. She said she got her first job as a result of some of the professional service work she did with her future co workers. She says she “wouldn’t have done the professional service if I had not been introduced to [the association] through the program, by being encouraged to attend conferences and being encouraged to get involved with or learn about committee work.” She also made a lot of connections to  institutions and museum professionals in the Seattle area,“To this day, I still to refer back to [Seattle institutions] as examples of people doing exemplary work or a specific kind of work that someone else might be interested in.”

Over the years, Museology’s alumni network has helped with informal mentoring and advice- and resource-sharing through bonds forged in common interests and particular expertise. She and other alumni often sit on committees together, work in similar areas of the field, or advocate for each other’s work. Renae currently sits on the board of the Visitor Studies Association (VSA), where she regularly interacts with Museology alumni. For instance, she is currently working with fellow alum Patty Montaño in a group working to connect VSA to more diverse communities.

Minnesota State Arts Board workshop led by Renae. Gallery walk of logic models. Credit: Expose Your Museum
Minnesota State Arts Board workshop led by Renae. Gallery walk of logic models. Credit: Expose Your Museum

Renae is still an active advocate for museums making an impact in their communities. “The most important thing to my agency is what difference our grantees are making for the people they are serving, and I get to help them show that to us and to their constituents.” While she has been working in her state to ensure that these institutions are making an impact in their communities, she is also doing this work at the national level. Renae co-led a task force of museum professionals within AAM’s LGBTQ Alliance professional network to write and disseminate LGBTQ “Welcoming Guidelines for Museums,” a publication by the American Alliance of Museums. This reference and self-assessment guide outlines ways for museums to create a more inclusive environment in museums, and ways for institutions to include LGBTQ voices in various areas of museum practice.

Overall, Renae “think[s] of [Museology] as a friendly crucible” that gave her a chance to participate in intellectual, professional, and academic practices that have helped her in her current career path. Museology has served not only as a shared context that has introduced her to people she cares about, but also as a framework she can continually return to and rely on, both professionally and personally.

Sydney Dratel, Museology Communications Assistant