State History

MANY welcomes proposals for conference sessions, workshops, panel discussions, facilitated discussions, and peer-to-peer learning experiences that focus on our 2024 conference theme, Giving Voice to Value. 

Join hundreds of museum professionals from across the state to discuss the proposition that it is time to look at new ways to communicate our value to stakeholders, funders, legislators, visitors, and communities. Museums dedicate resources to rationalize relevance, impact, community service, and investment in collections, programs, and facilities. What if those resources could be allocated to doing the work instead of pursuing funding for the next big thing that will help keep the doors open? What could our future look like if we created a sustainable business model that connected collections, education, and communications and correlated our values to our budgets?

We're looking for conference sessions that are 75 or 90-minutes in length or two to three hour long, immersive, and interactive workshops.

Proposals should share how you and your colleagues recently:

→ Collaborated with colleagues on a project that highlights the value of museums in our cultural ecosystem
→ Grew capacity and revenue
→ Raised awareness of functional and capital necessities
→ Shared the relevance and importance of collections
→ Adapted programming to meet audience needs 
→ Crafted new interpretive strategies to increase community engagement
→ Expanded mission to serve new audiences 
→ Nurtured human resources to build equity and inclusion
→ Developed programs connected to commemorations
→ Adopted new ways to communicate with stakeholders, funders, and legislators
→ Secured and improved accessibility to historic structures
→ Increased financial sustainability
→ Changed organizational culture 
→ and Created opportunities to support democracy