Student Life: Education and Outreach volunteer officer
Student Life views written by former students from the MA Museums & Galleries in Education, UCL Institute of Education
Education and Outreach volunteer officer for Rectory Lane Cemetery in Berkhamsted, Catherine Walker
In 2016 I began my MA in Museums and Galleries in Education. I studied part time over two years, whilst teaching part time in a primary school. I was a mature student, being 46 years old when I started. I also volunteered at Bletchley Park leading the school group tours. It was an incredible course, one that challenged me, raised my self-confidence, and enabled long term connections and friendships to be formed.
Once I had finished the course the next decision was – what next? I had the opportunity to become a full time teacher, my daughter was going to university and with the ‘empty nest ‘syndrome looming I took that option. However, I had a six-week trip to Australia booked in the Autumn school term, which my school kindly honoured.
It was during that holiday that I received the email to say I had passed my MA. It was also that holiday that I started to use my new MA skills. I visited every museum and gallery I could during my visit. In the Sydney Maritime Museum I went on the “ Endeavour’ ship, a full scale replica of the real ship commanded by Captain Cook. I took photographs and immediately started creating learning resources for teaching the Year 2 classes back home. You’ll recognise the signs… creating a story around it, dressing up as Captain Cook in class to pretend to recruit the children to be the crew for my journey, using museum and gallery sources for a whole terms project.
This love of planning and delivering learning resources using museums and galleries to inspire the children continued into the next two years of teaching. In December 2019 Ofsted appeared at school. They did a deep dive into history and the lead inspector gave high praise for the use of the National Archives Great Fire of London learning resource pack I had used with the Year 2 children. They had absolutely loved it, and the Ofsted inspector commented on how clear it was that the children had been challenged and the deep learning they had experienced.
At this point I knew I wanted to be the one writing those types of resources. Teaching wasn’t enough any more. I wanted to make a wider impact on children’s learning rather than just in my school. I handed my notice in, but remained in school until July 2020. So I was teaching online during the pandemic, still using museum and gallery links wherever I could.
Since September 2020 I have become a member of GEM and attended several of their online CPD events. I have been lucky enough to be accepted on the GEM one to one mentorship scheme to work on becoming freelance, or to apply for part time jobs in the heritage sector.
I have also become the Education and Outreach volunteer officer for Rectory Lane Cemetery in Berkhamsted. This has turned out to be truly valuable, collaborating with the Community Engagement Officer and Website designer to develop and deliver online learning resources for local schools.
I am now committed to finding my path in the Museums and Galleries in Education world and continue to be extremely grateful for the support from Caroline since this journey started.