You may have noticed that we have not been blogging as regularly on this site. This is because all of our blogs and news have moved onto the website at https://www.edinburghmuseums.org.uk/stories instead.
Please do click over to the page to see all of the updates and news from the team. Thank you for reading our blog!
The Ethnic Minority Career Museum & Built Environment Heritage Programme
Would you like to work in museums? We are working with the Next Step Initiative to offer Traineeships with bursaries. There are several opportunities available:
Traineeships are supported by a bursary which is non-repayable.
All trainees will be supported to do a qualification in Museum and Galleries Practice.
Visa status must allow full time working in UK.
Traineeship provides
• An opportunity to work within the Museum and Galleries sector.
• A chance to gain skills, knowledge and understanding of a variety of departments (e.g. collections management, conservation, audience development, learning and interpretation and community engagement).
• Scope to build a career path in the sector.
• Scope to use existing transferable skills
• An opportunity to be instrumental in bringing the African and ethnic minorities communities into the sector for: leisure, education or employment
• A platform for you to excel and develop professionally and personally.
Selection Criteria
• Applicants must have a willingness to learn and strive within the sector.
• No specific academic qualifications are required; however, applicants should be able to read and write fluent English.
• An enthusiasm for heritage
• The traineeships are only open to people from African and Caribbean/ Ethnic Minority Communities across Scotland.
Application Instructions
Contact Dr Rosemary Sleith for an Application Pack by email r.sleith@nextstepinitiative.org.uk
or call her on 0754265293 to discuss traineeship
Interviews will be 12th February 2020 (Museum & Galleries, Edinburgh) and 18th or 19th February 2020 (Glasgow Life, Glasgow).
Would you like to develop exciting outreach projects for Museums & Galleries Edinburgh? We are recruiting for a part-time Outreach & Access Manager. The role is temporary until the end of July 2020.
See My Job Scotland for more details.
We recently held our annual volunteers thank you event at the Museum of Edinburgh. The weather was on our side this year as it was the hottest day of the year (so far!).
Many of our wonderful volunteers came along in the heat and we were entertained by Steve Burnett on the violin. The event is an opportunity for us to thank our volunteers for all of their hard work throughout the year, and for them to meet each other and enjoy some refreshments in our courtyard after hours.
This year was a double celebration as it was also the 30th anniversary of the People’s Story Museum. Volunteers made a huge contribution to setting up the museum in 1989 and we were joined by ex-staff who worked on the project. Our People’s Story cake was a big hit! You can learn more about how the museum was set up in our current exhibition, The People’s Story at 30: the Making of the Museum.
Thank you to all who came to the event, and to all of our volunteers for the contribution they make to Museums & Galleries Edinburgh throughout the year.
Museums Manager Frank Little cutting the People’s Story birthday cake with some of the ex-staff who set up the museum in 1989.
Some of the young mums at the launch of Every Day is a New Day
I’ve recently been involved in a fantastic project run by Children in Scotland with a young mums group based at the Citadel Youth Centre in Leith. As part Children in Scotland’s Heritage Hunters project, which aimed to broaden the participation of children and young people in heritage settings, we worked together on two workshops with a group of young women under 21 and their children.
The group decided that they’d like to write a story about what it’s like to be a young mum, for their children to read when they are older. We discussed the particular difficulties young mums face, and compared this to the experience of mums in the past, looking at items and photographs from our baby and early childhood reminiscence box.
Writer Mike Nicholson was brought in to turn the women’s words into a story, and this was complimented with design and illustrations by Anders Frang.
The book was launched with a reception at the City Chambers hosted by council leader, Adam McVey. The young mums read extracts from the book together with staff from the Citadel. It was a very emotional and proud moment for everyone involved.
We’re delighted that the book will soon be available for visitors to read at our current exhibition, Bringing Up Baby at the Museum of Childhood.
Every Day is a New Day: A story by young mums for their bairns- to be read when they are older is available to read here.
Photo: some of The Welcoming group at the People’s Story
In the last few weeks I’ve been busy working with different groups from around Edinburgh.
I ran two sessions with The Welcoming, a charity that supports people who are new to Edinburgh. They took part in tours around the People’s Story and the Museum Collections Centre. We also looked at some museum objects to instigate discussions about Edinburgh and how things differ in other countries. The group now intends to create a ‘Newcomers box’ of objects that tell stories of the participants’ journeys to Edinburgh.
Our partnership with Children in Scotland on their Heritage Hunters project continues and we’re working together with the Citadel Youth Centre’s young mums group. We held two sessions with a group of young mums and their babies exploring what it’s like to be a young mum today and how parenting might have changed. We looked at objects from our baby reminiscence box, which tied in well to the current exhibition at the Museum of Childhood, Bringing up Baby. The exhibition explores the dilemmas of parenthood and is well worth a visit to see how things have changed! The young mums then worked with writer Mike Nicholson to create a storybook about being a mum, for their children to read when they are older.
I’ve also run some reminiscence sessions with the Scottish War Blinded centre and Ratho over 50s group. It’s always interesting to hear about people’s memories and I learned some new terms including a ‘pouring out’ which was when wedding parties distributed small change for children!
If you’d like to find out more about booking one of our loan or reminiscence boxes, please have a look at the website.
Our latest exhibition, Young Carers in Charge, is now open at the People’s Story. It’s the culmination of a partnership project with national charity, Children in Scotland and Edinburgh Young Carers.
Young Carers in Charge is part of a nationwide project led by Children in Scotland which aims to broaden the participation of children and young people in heritage settings across Scotland. Children in Scotland approached us to be their Edinburgh-based heritage partner and we’ve been delighted to work with them.
During October and November we ran workshops with a group of young carers aged 9 – 16. We explored the young people’s understandings of heritage and discussed different options for the project. The group decided that they would like to hold their own exhibition and so they heard from curators Anna and Lyn who talked to the group about how to plan and organise an exhibition. We then spent three sessions at the Museum Collections Centre where Collections Care Officer, Gwen gave the young people an insight into the collections and showed them how we care for museum objects.
The young people then selected items from the museum collections to display in their exhibition, and they were invited to include significant items from their own lives. The objects represent subjects that are important to the young people, including family, sports, hobbies and sweets! The exhibition also gives an insight into some of the issues that young carers face.
Young Carers in Charge is on at the People’s Story until 31 March 2019.
Some of the objects chosen by the young people.
Art in the City provides an opportunity for people whose lives are affected by dementia and their friends, families and carers to share a gallery visit and discuss art (and other things) in a friendly and supportive environment.
Image: Robert Blomfield
The next sessions will be:
10 January at the Robert Blomfield exhibition at the City Art Centre.
14 February at Surgeon’s Hall Museums
All sessions are 10:30-12 and are free.
If you are interested in attending, please contact Diana Morton: diana.morton@edinburgh.gov.uk or 0131 529 6365 to be added to the mailing list to receive the most up to date information.
This letter to Santa comes from the Museum of Childhood collections. It dates from 1984 and (very much on trend) asks for Castle Greyskull, He-Man, Battle Cat, Skeletor, Panthor, Skeletor and the Knight Rider car! What is on your list this year?
Wishing you all the best for Christmas and New Year!
At this time of year our thoughts often turn back to the events of the last 12 months. So I wanted to write a blog to celebrate some of my key events of 2018.
One of the big events for me was welcoming Ria as my jobshare. It has been wonderful working with her and we have some joint projects planned for 2019- watch this space! You can find out more about her work on her blogs about Herstory Woven and the Edinburgh glass exhibition tour.
One of my big pieces of work was the redevelopment of the Wee Museum of Newhaven at Victoria Primary. You can now visit the new exhibition ‘Newhaven Stories’ at the school.
In the summer it was wonderful to be a part of the development of Their Work is Not Forgotten- the exhibition celebrating 100 years of women’s suffrage. The museums also hosted workshops for Processions and took part in the event to celebrate the centenary.
Adi also joined our team and I hope you have been enjoying his blog posts. You will also have seen some of his posts if you follow our social media channels.
2018 also saw the continuation of some projects. The small touring version of Proud City has continued pop-up in local libraries and high schools across the city. Our loan and reminiscence box service has continued to be popular and provide resources for groups across the city and further afield.
Also the Art in the City group has continued to offer visits to venues for people with a diagnosis of dementia and their friends, families and carers. Our January 2019 visit will be to the Robert Blomfield exhibition at the City Art Centre. If you would like to join the group please email diana.morton@edinburgh.gov.uk to be added to our mailing list.
More recently I have been very lucky to take part in the speed networking at the Eurocities conference. I have also spoken to a range of student groups- including the museum studies courses at St Andrews and Aberdeen Universities. I am also currently hosting Catherine who is on placement from St Andrews and is helping with developing new loan boxes.
Still ongoing is the work taking place around developing British Sign Language interpretation for our buildings. This year we have offered a range of BSL and descriptive tours for people with visual impairments. Next year we will launch new BSL films about our venues and we are hoping to develop our first digital BSL tour! Staff will also take part in Deaf awareness training. All of this work has been funded by See Hear.
Thank you for your support in 2018 and here’s to a successful 2019!
Museums & Galleries Edinburgh Outreach 