Great universities have great museums.
From Pentacrest Museums Director Liz Crooks
For the Pentacrest Museums, 2022 was marked by the alignment of several things: an advantageous administrative move, remarkable campus and community connections, successful in-person programming, an overarching theme of “mindfulness in museums,” a big fundraising campaign, and an even bigger amount of joy and gratitude.
I invite you to join us in a look back at a year we're quite proud of in two museums we hope you call yours.
BY THE NUMBERS
Our Visitor Services Department works with our campus and the public to schedule class visits and tours, manage our student docents, and keep our galleries accessible to guests.
- Total visitors: 37,083
- Still below our average pre-pandemic visitor numbers, we more than doubled our attendance from 2021. Considering the temporary construction closure of one of our main entrances over the summer, we're quite pleased.
- Note: due to multiple entrances in Macbride Hall, data recorded for the Museum of Natural History indicates only guests entering the east entrance to Iowa Hall (we estimate this to be less than half of our total guests).
- Number of guided gallery tours: 154
- These are tours given by student docents employed by the Pentacrest Museums. It is our honor to connect with guests this way and to give our students the opportunity to teach.
- Total number of guests on a guided gallery tour: 4,952
- Number of college class visits to galleries: 100
- 61/100 were self-guided visits, which means an instructor used our exhibitions to teach their own curriculum.
Our Education Department works to create interactive programming to support connectivity, engagement, and learning in museum spaces.
- Total number of programs: 64
- In-person: 36
- Virtual: 28
- Total number of program participants: 1,982
- In-person: 1,263
- Virtual: 719
- Note: We reached participants from US 27 states and beyond with guests from all around the world including: Israel, Canada, Colombia, and Germany.
Our Events staff create revenue for our free-admission museums by offering excellence as a venue for special events (weddings, lectures, conferences, etc.) in our historic spaces.
- Total events: 54
- Weddings: 4
- Receptions: 21
- Community events: 4
- Lectures: 13
- Conferences: 3
- UI ceremonies/graduations: 12
Our Communications staff manages messaging, branding, social media, websites, signage, and more. They promote our services and keep folks in the know, prioritizing access.
A combination of more strategic content and new types of media led to an increase by all measures on our social channels, with most success on Instagram with 18-24 year olds.
- Social media posts across all channels: 1,266 (↑ 472)
- Social media post reach across all channels: 590,407 (↑ 346K)
- New fans and followers across all channels: 939 (↑ 414)
- Most successful post: https://www.instagram.com/reel/CjN5q8YgBJ5/
Our first full year with all 3 updated, functioning websites and targeted marketing drove web traffic:
- Total number of web users who visited our websites: 58,037 (↑ 18.68%)
- Percentage of new web users: 48,396
- Total number of webpages visited on our websites: 138,427 (↑ 18.79%)
Effective communications and fresh websites led to more general google web searches and access
- Google business profiles viewed: 411,382 times
- 167,580 times via maps
- 243,443 times via google searches
- 6,987 searches resulted in customers using directions
- 6,612 searches resulted in webpage traffic, beyond hours and location
Our Collections team cares for our specimens and objects, keeps them accessible to classes and researchers both on and off campus, and holds the incredible responsibility of preserving our history.
- Number of newly accessioned items: 572
- Number of class visits to collections spaces or our museum lab: 28
- Number of students on class visits to collections spaces or our lab: 496
- Number of collections items loaned: 2,176 in 28 total loans
- Online collections access:
- Our collections data appeared in 4,325,229,921 searches
- Our collections records were downloaded 647,104 times
- Our collections records were citated in published research 237 times
Our museums are proud to host student employment positions for many UI students each year and additional opportunities for interns and volunteers.
- Total number of students employed (museum docents and staff assistants): 37
- Total number of for-credit internships: 17
- Total number of museum volunteers: 6 (320.8 hours)
- Members of the Pentacrest Museums Student Advisory Board: 15
STRATEGIC PLAN IN ACTION
Holistic Well-Being with Museum Programming
As we moved forward from years impacted by COVID-closures, we paused to take stock of where we were as a campus and community. We reflected deeply on what we have to offer to meet the present needs of our students, staff, faculty, and community members. A shifted perspective in our potential led us to create opportunities and programming with mindfulness, connectivity, and inclusivity in mind.
Holistic Well-Being with Museum Programming
Our Tree Tours program series helped us get away from screens, incorporate some movement into our days, and reconnect with each other and nature. 423 guests joined us on a Tree Tour in 2022.
Our Art & Write Night program series helped us reconnect, build community, and get inspired when we needed it most. Our first series to return to in-person offerings, 487 participants attended an Art & Write Night.
The museums were represented at the 23rd annual Latinx Youth Summit, where 216 high school students and their chaperones from 20 different high schools in 11 counties across the state of Iowa were present. Mindfulness in museums and nature with a special Tree Tour were offered to the students during a program called Know Your Nature.
We dedicated space in Iowa Hall for a Community Art Gallery Wall. Pieces featured on changing exhibition there were created by guests in our space. Making together and having our creations cherished as part of an established community is just one way we build well-being into our campus culture.
Our Student Advisory Board organized and hosted a packed house for Trivia Night at the Old Capitol. Collectively, we needed some fun, and that's exactly what was served. More than 150 students participated.
For the first time in many years, we marched in the Iowa Homecoming Parade. Our Student Advisory Board organized our participation, which reached 15,000 people! Onlookers yelled, "Rusty!" and "I love Old Cap!" as we marched. The team effort in such a celebratory way was exactly what we needed.
Our My Collections exhibition series featured 4 new UI student, staff, and faculty collectors and their personal collections in displays that touched hearts. When our staff and students can be seen and celebrated for their personal interests, our community gets stronger.
Herky visited! When campus was in need of some spirit lifting, we knew who to call. We hosted more than 150 guests at our onIowa event, and Herky brought some cheer to every last one of them.
Excellence in Teaching and Learning at Museums you LOVE
Our museums are filled with opportunities to elevate the high-quality teaching that happens on our campus. We foster dynamic, hands-on exploration and educational experiences that empower our educators to achieve their teaching goals and help our students achieve their aspirations.
Excellence in Teaching and Learning
Our galleries are classrooms. We invite instructors to teach in our spaces, getting out of textbooks and into exhibitions to illustrate their curriculum. 100 UI classes used our museums to teach in 2022.
The high-impact educational opportunities in our museums create pathways to specialized careers. Our Collections team supported students in their learning the art of specimen prep in our laboratories.
Last year we employed more than 30 students who are learning on-the-job in real museums before they graduate. Whether working in the lab, administrative offices, or the galleries, we teach by doing.
We hosted guests on 154 museum tours and special visits, each guided by our own college students. When the students become the teachers, we know we're doing it right.
A Welcoming and Inclusive Environment at YOUR Museums
It takes a commitment from each of us to cultivate a more respectful, inclusive environment on our campus. This year we had difficult conversations with the goal of growth. We listened, we learned, and we got to work. From welcoming new voices to our programming to expanding access in our spaces, we put inclusivity at the top of our list.
Welcoming and Inclusive Environment
Our director of education and engagement Carolina Kaufman serves on both the Native American Council and the UI Latinx Council. Much of her museum work in 2022 was inspired by these connections and we're better for it.
Our official move to all new, UI-branded websites eliminated barriers and improved accessibility for all visitors.
In panel discussions, our education department reserved space for new voices such as indigenous leaders (like Luke Kapayou pictured here), women of color, and experts of all backgrounds and perspectives. Representation matters, and we aim to inspire and empower every member of our community.
We gave our navigational language and signage an overhaul. From on-site wayfinding to web information, brochures, and beyond, we've eliminated barriers for all in finding and enjoying our spaces.
Museums Support Innovative Research and Creative Discovery
To advance the success of UI scholars, researchers, and artists, we support a culture of creativity, innovation, and interdisciplinary collaboration. With collaborative community programming, broader impacts opportunities, and historic research collections, we increase involvement of our students at all levels in research, creative work, and engagement.
Innovative science
In an interdisciplinary collaboration between many UI departments, we helped to organize and run a BioBlitz at the UI Ashton Prairie Restoration site. Hundreds showed up to observe, collect, and record the return of biodiversity to the prairie ecosystem in a community-based scientific programming model. Collections from the event joined our permanent research collections and will be used in comparative data analysis in the 20 years until the prairie is considered established.
Our research collections are available via digital databases to researchers around the world. In research seeking to answer some of the most important questions we face as a society, our digital access collections were cited in published research 237 times and showed up in billions of queries.
Digital collections access is supported by the work of students who work to photograph, document, and enter data into a searchable database. Their contribution to science is remarkable.
We partnered with University of Iowa M.F.A. printmaking graduate student and teaching assistant Mariceliz Pagán Gómez for artistic research and audience engagement. Their upcoming M.F.A. show will be inspired by museum research.
For the third year, we participated in the National Science Foundation grant-funded Interdisciplinary Evolutionary Sciences Research Experiences for Undergraduates program. This year, we assisted with digitizing scientific posters with software we use to make virtual exhibitions for innovative, accessible, far-reaching student science.
Museums Make Transformative Societal Impacts
We join greater campus efforts to expand impact on local and regional communities, the state of Iowa, and the world by leveraging areas of distinction, resources, and the collective talents of our campus community. Through public exhibitions, support of local schools and businesses, and even representation at international conferences, we expand opportunities and increase access.
Societal Impacts
Each year we are the point of entry to the University of Iowa for thousands of K-12 students in Iowa (4,461 this year, to be exact). The hands-on, exploratory, and welcoming experiences for our young with collegiate professionals and students teaching science and history at our museums result in wonderment and college readiness, increasing access to higher education in Iowa.
In partnership with International Programs and Dr. Kirsten Kumpf Baele, and as part of the Provost's Global Forum, we welcomed the exhibition Let Me Be Free: The Life Story of Anne Frank. In early spring, we became the 13th US site of an Anne Frank Sapling—a horse chestnut tree propagated from a tree which was special to Anne.
Our director of research collections Cindy Opitz represented the University of Iowa Museum of Natural History on the board of the Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collections (SPNHC), and at the conference in Edinburgh, Scotland, UK. This international organization is devoted to the preservation, conservation, and management of natural history collections.
Director of Education and Engagement Carolina Kaufman was a scholarship award recipient to the American Alliance of Museums conference, where she explored the social and community impact of museums and strengthened connections with peers from all around the country. She brought back to our campus museums the knowledge from museum leaders all around the country to make the best experiences for our students at home.
Pentacrest Museums Director Liz Crooks represented the museums at the International Panorama Conference held in Luxembourg. This connection with our peers in historic preservation at the international level has poised the University of Iowa as the location for the 2023 conference, with the Museum of Natural History's Laysan Island Cyclorama as the centerpiece.
Museum Director Liz Crooks was named Iowa State Representative by the Association of Academic Museums and Galleries. This is the ideal partnership for strengthening our campus and national efforts in museum excellence.
MORE TO CELEBRATE
2022 kicked off a major fundraising campaign to restore the Laysan Island Cyclorama. It's been an incredible team effort to save it.
Donations to the Laysan Island Cyclorama fund: $296,191
- 21 gifts from 8 states
- 6 gifts of $5,000+
- 2 major gift commitments
- $900 in online gifts
- $1,000 in gift shop sales rounded-up
Best-performing publication:
In May, Iowa Magazine published A Paradise Not Yet Lost on the history of the Laysan Island Cyclorama exhibition and the need for restoration. Distributed in over 65,000 printed magazines and accessed online even more, it was our highest performing publication in 2022, kicking off a major fundraising campaign.
Most notable research:
In November, Dr. Holmes Semken and a team of others published esteemed research on the Tarkio Valley Sloths that were recovered, studied, and preserved at the University of Iowa. Twenty years after the initial discovery, this now-published research is considered the most comprehensive to date on the species.
WITH GRATITUDE
Our administrative move from the Office of the Vice President for Research to the Office of the Provost created impactful changes behind the scenes.
- Closer alignment with campus peers
- Bolstered reach to students
- Facilitated campus and community connections
We extend heartfelt gratitude to all of our campus and community partners, supporters, and volunteers. Whether you helped with the development of a program or exhibition, hosted a special event here, donated to our efforts with time or money, or supported the efforts of our team, we thank you.
Special Thanks
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Andrew Dahl, University Arborist, for his support and dedication to our natural spaces on campus, which contributed to the development and delivery of the Tree Tour experience.
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Trevor Viohl, class of 2022, in their extended volunteer research and support to Education in the development of the Tree Tour experience.
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The liveWELL team for all their advocacy and collaboration to engage our campus in support of health and workplace wellness both through the Tree Tour experience and liveWELL Scavenger Hunt.
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Human Resources, for inviting us to be part of Discover Your University programming, creating even greater opportunities for visibility and engagement with our museums.
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International Programs, for their collaboration in training our docents to leading specially guided educational experiences for young people visiting the Anne Frank exhibit, Let Me Be Myself.
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Our entire team of dedicated student staff employees, who serve as ambassadors to our museums. We are proud and thankful for these students, who are gaining many desired job skills while serving our mission.
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UIReach, for their collaboration with us to provide workforce development opportunities for the UI Reach student community and support our own museum efforts to expand access and engagement for all.
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Mariceliz Pagan Gomez, for her contributions and expertise as a professional artist and MFA student helping to lead a studio program for the Art & Write Night program.
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Keith Buckman, for completing 2650 hours of volunteer service spanning ten years.
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Jack Tamesia, for his research and amazing storytelling in the published piece on Laysan Island in Iowa Magazine.
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Dr. Holmes Semken, Tiffany Adrain, and Sarah Horgen, for their dedication to the Museum of Natural History and the Tarkio Valley Sloth research.
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Travis Foss, for his dedication to the Laysan Island Cyclorama fund campaign.
And so many others in areas all around campus and across our community:
- University of Iowa Office of the President
- Office of the Provost
- Office of the Vice President for Research
- Office of Strategic Communications
- Iowa Magazine
- Center for Advancement
- International Programs
- Student Life
- Art Department
- Cultural Centers
- Human Resources- liveWELL
- Facilities Management
- Office of Sustainability
- DEAI-Center for Inclusive Academic Excellence
- Division of World Languages, Literature, and Cultures
- UIReach
- Latinx Council
- Native American Council
- UI Libraries
- Stanley Museum of Art
- Office of the State Archaeologist
- Office of Teaching and Learning
- Department of Family Medicine
- Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences
- Anthropology Department
- Paleontology Department
- Anne Frank House Amsterdam
- Tippie College of Business
- College of Liberal Arts and Sciences
- UI Pride Alliance Center
- University of Iowa Student Government and Graduate Student Government
- University of Iowa Lecture Committee
- Public Policy Center
- UI Office of the Provost
- Iowa PBS
- Molecular Biology Department
- American Association for Anatomy
- Prairie Lights Bookstore
- Iowa City Downtown District
- Night Mayor Iowa City
- Kirkwood Community College
