4 minute read
Treasure keepers
from Just For Laughs
A LOOK BEHIND THE CURTAIN AT THE VOLUNTEERS SUPPORTING OKLAHOMA’S MUSEUMS
By Kendra Michal Johnson
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Impeccably dressed, knowledgeable, patient—the docent guiding the group of curious school children through a museum gallery for their field trip is a well-known sight and experience.
Docents provide crucial services guiding tours, explaining exhibits and helping protect and preserve the museum’s legacies.
“A purist in the volunteer world would say that a docent is somebody that has gone through very rigorous training, very detailed training, of whatever environment they’re working in,” Oklahoma History Center Director of Marketing and Volunteer Coordinator Steve Hawkins said.
They use this training to provide tours and information for visitors.
“The way that docents function here at the Oklahoma City Museum of Art—and they may be different other places—what they do here is they lead tours, guided tours of our exhibitions, whether that is for school aged children, or adult groups who have come to visit us. They also help us with our art activities,” Oklahoma City Museum of Art (OKCMoA) Manager of Digital and Gallery Learning Tori Waldron said.
With their wide range of knowledge and professional demeanors, it can come as a surprise that these are typically volunteer roles, and that the term docent is sometimes used to refer to a wide range of museum volunteer roles, beyond the typical “purist” description.
“Volunteering, in general, is something that a lot of large institutions like the History Center, any museum, they really can’t survive without,” Hawkins said.
Waldron agreed.
“They are part of our frontline,” she said, “when they’re interacting with members of the public, with school tours. I would encourage people to think about when they visit museums, who do you see first, very often, it is a volunteer greeter.”
OKCMoA’s volunteer program currently has approximately 30 participants.
The Oklahoma History Center has approximately 75 museum volunteers, not including the approxi- mately 30-35 volunteers in the research segment of the History Center.
“In the state of Oklahoma a volunteer is worth $25 an hour, $15 an hour for work and $10 for insurance, just like they’re an employee,” Hawkins said.
These numbers are calculated and then presented to the state legislature each month, and the museum volunteers’ contributions to the Oklahoma History Center are in the thousands of dollars.
“They contribute around anywhere between $5,000-$7,000 a month to our effort,” he said. “And, you know, you add it all up, and that’s typically a full time employee for the year.”
The overall impact of volunteers on a museum is enormous.
“They do it in little segments of two hours and five hours, you know, all year long,” Hawkins said. “So they’re very valuable to us, not just for the money, but for the friendships and the camaraderie.”
One of the misconceptions Waldron said she sees regarding docents is that someone has to already know a lot about art before volunteering to be a docent.
“I would encourage anyone who is interested in art and wants to give back to their community to apply,” Waldron said. “People of diverse backgrounds, with very different kinds of jobs and life experiences often lead very interesting and very different conversations.”
Museum docent programs at museums provide training to their volunteers.
“We focus on the content, right, what literally is in the exhibition, what do we know about the artworks, and then we also provide our docents with training about some of those soft skills like group management,” Waldron said.
Docents receive training both at the start of their volunteering and continuing training along the way.
“Being able to have a set group of people that I meet with regularly to talk about art, or talk about how we want to talk about art, that by far is for me the most enjoyable part,” Waldron said.
At the newly renovated Oklahoma Capitol Building, the first group of volunteer docents has recently completed training through the Oklahoma Arts Council to provide tours of the numerous artworks throughout the Capitol.
“I’ve always felt pretty good about the political side of it and the history side, but I’ve really enjoyed in the training that we got into the art, learning about the arts,” Oklahoma Capitol Building Volunteer Docent Rick Hill said.
Before the renovations, tours at the Capitol were handled through the Oklahoma Tourism & Recreation Department.
“When the Capitol restoration began, and we removed the majority of the artwork to protect it, we had several years where it was out,” Oklahoma Arts Council Director of Marketing and Communications Joel Gavin said.
The renovation provided an opportunity to rethink the tours.
“All of our art tells the story of Oklahoma and the history of Oklahoma,” Oklahoma Arts Council Curator of Education and Engagement Amanda Harmer said. “So we were able to design a curatorial plan that moves chronologically and thematically, so hopefully for visitors that storytelling is apparent and makes sense. It makes for a great tour for us.”
For Oklahoma History Center Volunteer Docent Diana Collinsworth, her journey to volunteering began before the new History Center opened in 2005.
“There was a little ad saying the Oklahoma History Center is under construction and we need volunteers when it opens,” Collinsworth said. “So not having any idea because it was under construction, not having any idea what I was volunteering for, I went to the basement of the old historical museum where the training was being held, and I signed up, took the three day training.”
She’s now been at the History
Center for more than 15 years.
“One of the things I love most is the ability to enhance their visit, by encountering someone in a gallery and being able to give them a little background on an artifact that isn’t on the plaque that they’ve just read,” Collinsworth said.
Each time an exhibit opens or changes, docents are provided with additional information and training, she said.
“The thing I love most is when they spot something in a gallery and say, ‘My grandmother had one of those; and they tell you their stories, because I love hearing their stories,” she said.
Fellow Oklahoma History Center Docent Harry Kocurek said the continuing education is one of the best parts of serving as a docent.
“I always learn something,” Kocurek said. “When it’s a special event or something, I try to do some background, or ask the curators for some additional information.”
While docents primarily provide tours and information, museum volunteers also help with education activities, such as living history events, and other programs.
“We are very conscious of the fact that we represent the museum, wherever we are,” Collinsworth said.
Ultimately, it’s about volunteers sharing their love for their museum’s collections with attendees.
“Our guests may have two hours, tops, to be in the building,” Kocurek said. “And it’s a big building. If we can make it through in two hours, that’s a good day. We’ve done our job. But it’s—you never have enough time. I want them to leave thinking, ‘I want to come back’.”
More information about volunteering as a docent can be found at arts.ok.gov, okhistory.org, and okcmoa.com. All three organizations are currently accepting volunteer applications.
