We have supported a series of museum and school partnerships, projects between museums and a variety of community-based organizations, and, inherent to our mission, partnerships between museums and libraries. These partnerships have changed how museums work. The activities accompanying these partnerships have also been diverse. In many communities, museums become social narrators, gathering and sharing previously untold stories. In others they serve as safe havens for afterschool programming, for training and employing at-risk youth in need of meaningful work.
Museums fill in the gaps in school districts where formal art education has been eliminated.
The stories that emerge from these programs suggest powerful impact. The Belknap Mill Society in Laconia, New Hampshire used its success at saving an historic textile mill as the foundation for stimulating local business and government to revitalize a languishing town. The Society's leadership succeeded in bringing the community together to develop a comprehensive city plan, much of which has already been realized. The Wing Luke Asian Museum, located in Seattle's Chinatown International District, works toward preserving the history and cultural legacy of the area through deep community involvement. Community members become exhibition curators, working collaboratively across generational and ethnic lines, to share pieces of their own lives.