Museum Studies

Work Experience

Work experience opportunities form an important part of the degree programme and we provide these in a number of ways.

As part of your degree

As part of your degree you can take an optional Work Placement course that provides valuable work experience in a museum, gallery or other cultural institution. We have close links with a number of institutions, giving students the chance to engage in a project-based work placement, where they can explore a possible future career, while meeting professional practitioners and developing skills and experience.

Students can also gain insight into the world of museum work through the Museum Practice course (Theory and Practice strand) or The Hunterian Exhibition course (all strands). Museum Practice is taught by staff from Glasgow Museums in the renowned Glasgow Museums Resource Centre. On this course students get to hear first hand accounts of museum work and experience it themselves through project work that contributes to an ongoing Glasgow Museums activity. In The Hunterian Exhibition course students are exposed to the range of museum work through the perspective of exhibition development. As well as being taught by staff from The Hunterian, students undertake activities based in the museum.

As an alternative to a dissertation students can also take the option of The Hunterian Exhbition Research and Development placement (not in conjunction with The Hunterian Exhibition course). This provides students with exhibition research and development placements in museums, galleries and other cultural institutions to work on an aspect of ongoing exhibition development over the summer months. This provides students with:

• experience that reflects the type of exhibition research and development they may encounter in the work place
• opportunity for a substantial piece of independent research work
• experience of working to a defined project brief and schedule
• extended period working with cultural heritage staff

Volunteering

As well as the work experience opportunites within the course we provide a range of other means to gain valuable work experience. The Hunterian runs its MUSE (Museum University Student Educators) programme that recruits volunteers to provide guided tours to visitors. Both The Hunterian and Glasgow Museums also have active volunteer programmes and we provide a range of other volunteer work experience opportunities from musems and galleries across the west of Scotland througout the year.

Graduate Internships

Each year Glasgow Museums provides three or four internships exclusively for graduates of our Museum Studies degree. These internships are three to six months, full or part-time, to help students bridge the gap between qualification and the world of work by building up a sustained body of work experience in a leading musem organisation.