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My first week as a Museum Futures Trainee

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This week I started a Museum Futures traineeship at Royal Pavilion & Museums.

Young woman standing outside museum entrance wearing a coatMuseum Futures is a year-long programme hosted by the British Museum and funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund with eight participating museums across the country, including Royal Pavilion & Museums, in which trainees aged 18-24 receive on-the-job training to help digitise their museum and will receive a Level 3 diploma in Cultural Heritage.

I was first interested in Museum Futures because I have a passion for history, having finished history A-Level last summer, and was searching for a history-related job so working in a museum was ideal for me. With no previous experience in the museum sector or working with digital technology, a traineeship seemed like the perfect place to start.

Along with the digital team I will be working on the digital preservation of collections for future access, digitalising visitor experience within the museum, digital publishing and improving existing online systems (such as the website and the Digital Media Bank).

Throughout the course of the year I will be travelling to the other participating museums to attend monthly training sessions in which all eight trainees will share their experiences, ideas and achievements, including one at Brighton Museum which I will help coordinate and host. The participating museums are:

  • Royal Pavilion & Museums
  • The British Museum
  • South West Heritage Trust
  • York Museums Trust
  • Norfolk Museums Service
  • National Museums Liverpool
  • Museum of East Anglian Life
  • Garden Museum

Most of my week has been spent familiarising myself with the Museum and its online systems (mainly the Digital Media Bank), contributing to the January edition of the Insider e-newsletter and meeting some of the people I am going to be working with over the next year.

I am really looking forward to expanding my digital skills, gaining experience of working in the museum sector and learning how to use new digital technology over the course of 2019.

Tasha Brown, Museum Futures Trainee

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