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Museum Evaluation without Borders: Four Imperatives for Making Museum Evaluation More Relevant, Credible, and Useful
Author(s) -
Preskill Hallie
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
curator: the museum journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.312
H-Index - 8
eISSN - 2151-6952
pISSN - 0011-3069
DOI - 10.1111/j.2151-6952.2010.00072.x
Subject(s) - social connectedness , evaluation methods , computer science , engineering ethics , sociology , political science , public relations , psychology , engineering , social psychology , reliability engineering
In this article, I invite readers to think outside of evaluation’s current boundaries and to see the deep connectedness between what museums hope to achieve and how we evaluate the extent to which these aspirations may be realized. To do this, I present four imperatives for making museum evaluation more relevant, credible, and useful: 1) Link program activities with intended outcomes and hoped‐for impact. 2) Take a systems‐oriented evaluation approach. 3) Use affirmative data collection approaches based on assets and strengths. 4) Engage in courageous conversations.