The Maryland Museums Association is an alliance of historical and cultural institutions that collect, hold, interpret, and protect the cultural and material heritage within the State. The association advocates for members by enhancing professionalism in those institutions and individuals, and promoting awareness of museum interests.
Call for Board Members
Maryland Museums Association is helping coordinate a statewide advocacy initiative to reinstate the State's Museum Assistance Program to provide state funding to Maryland museums when we need it most!
The Museum Assistance Program served the stateβs 200+ historical and cultural museums by providing grants, technical assistance, and networking opportunities from 1999 until 2011 β with the funding stopped. In 2016, the Maryland General Assembly required a report by the Maryland Historical Trust regarding museum and preservation funding. The #1 recommendation of that report was to bring back the Museum Assistance Program.
Now is the time to make it happen! Our museums, cultural centers, venues, and historic sites have been hard-hit by COVID β with operating and project funding needs unmet. We need new and energetic board members to lead this effort!
MMA is seeking a Vice Chair, Secretary, and up to 11 new board members for a three-year term. We will meet virtually monthly with opportunities to meet more frequently and/or in-person as needed. You need not have advocacy experience and there is no financial obligation. If you would like to join and help coordinate this effort, please submit a Board Member Application Form by August 15α΅α΄΄.
If you are not able to serve on the board, please consider a donation to MMA as an individual or on behalf of your organization, and of course, share this call for Board Members with your networks.
Open Surveys
Miller History Fund Survey
The Maryland Center for History and Culture is hosting an online survey in advance of opening the fourth funding cycle of their Thomas V. "Mike" Miller, Jr. History Fund. The survey is anonymous and should take approximately 10 minutes to complete. You do not have to have applied or received a Miller History Fund award. The survey is open to all stewards of Maryland history and culture.
Museum Collection Needs Survey
The Maryland History and Culture Collaborative (MHCC) is an informal gathering of individuals from throughout the state of Maryland whose personal and professional interests include the acquisition, preservation, management of and public access to collections and sites related to Maryland history and culture. The MHCC Collections Group is seeking to identify needs and assess areas where opportunity for greater collaboration exists, particularly centered on collections issues. To learn what areas institutions could most use support for their collections, we ask that you take a few minutes to complete this survey. The data produced by this survey will allow the Collections Group to plan strategically on how best to help institutions connect on collections projects.
Maryland Museum Funding Reports
PreserveMaryland: The Role of Museums and the Museum Assistance Program (2014)
The Maryland Historical Trust (MHT) Museum Assistance Program served the stateβs nearly 200 historical and cultural museums by providing grants, technical assistance and networking opportunities from 1999 to 2011, with the cessation of grant funding. In September 2013, MHT launched a formal needs assessment. This paper is the culmination of the needs assessment process, which opened with a statewide survey. Focus groups brought together museum representatives to review the surveyβs findings and to offer perspectives on future programming.
Maryland Historical Trust: Preservation, Survey, and Museum Funding Needs (Joint Chairman's Report (JCR), 2016)
For many years, Maryland was a national leader in providing support for the preservation and interpretation of our irreplaceable heritage. Historic preservation and history museum assistance programs were supported by the MHT Grant Fund, a continuing, non-lapsing special fund. Despite demonstrated demand for these programs, appropriations to the MHT Grant Fund were suspended beginning in fiscal year 2012.
At the close of the 2016 session of the Maryland General Assembly, the Chairmen of the Senate Budget and Taxation Committee and House Appropriations Committee directed MHT to work with partners to evaluate the state of its historic preservation and museum grant programs. The following report addresses specific issues identified by legislators including need and demand for this type of State support, funding options, staff capacity to administer these programs, and the experience of other states.
As this report demonstrates, the unmet needs of the stateβs historic preservation and history museum community are substantial. Threats to our tangible and intangible cultural heritage continue to grow. State and federal sources of funding for cultural resource preservation have all but disappeared, leaving our local government and private sector partners with few options.