Not the Nation's Attic: Collection Management in Yamba

As part of a follow up to our 2006 Standards Program, Tamara and I travelled up to the Northern Rivers to put on a Collection Management workshop with Museum Consultant Margot Jolly. The three of us flew into Ballina airport, and had a lovely drive south to Yamba where we met up with Marea Buist, President of the Port of Yamba Historical Society.

The next morning we sourced an excellent coffee from town, and made our way to the Museum to set up for the workshop. We were delighted to see that we were to hold the workshop in the beautiful little church on the side of the museum.

               Margot Jolly outside the church at the Yamba Museum

Delegates from all across the Northern Rivers began to arrive and were greeted with an amazing morning tea!

             Morning tea is set up as delegates arrive at the Museum

We began the day hearing a brief report from each museum present, and were really impressed to hear about all the hard work that has been going on since the Standards Program. Some museums had updated or developed new policies such as Marketing Plans, Collection Policies and IT Policies. Others had conducted Significance Assessments of their collections and several had been undertaking Strategic Planning.

Marea Buist (Yamba Museum) and Dr Richard Gates (the Evans Head Living Museum) share their museum's achievements since completing the 2006 Standards Program

Margot Jolly then began her lively presentation on the basics of Collection Management, which was highly interactive and encouraged a lot of group participation and feedback. A highlight was her talk on how to diplomatically say ‘no’ to potential donors of collection items! There was also an interesting discussion as people shared their experiences of deaccessioning, why it is important and how to go about it.

We are looking forward to getting together again with everybody for a workshop on Preventive Conservation in September in Alstonville. Thanks so much to Marea and the team at Yamba Museum for hosting us and for such a lovely day!