Daisy and her two penguin pals

I thoroughly enjoyed my year 12 work experience here, it provided me valuable and interesting insight into collection management and curation that has really helped me refine my interests in historical collections and museums. By far the most unexpected activity was helping switch an Object Box used in Victorian schools (loaned to British Schools Museum) with two taxidermy penguins which was a uniquely charming experience (including making a social media post about their arrival), from this I also learned about recording loans and deliveries, (and a bit about Victorian schooling).

For the last two days of my placement, I focused on documents about the Offley Morris Men overviewing the group’s existence from their inception in 1955 to their dissolution in 2016. I helped log them into accession records both online and in the museum’s accession book, this was probably my favourite part as I got to examine real historical records for the first time. Making this an especially interesting experience was the personal and domestic nature of the records, including handwritten logbooks detailing their dancing tours and a Ladies Night menu signed and doodled on by attendees.

This experience has overall been very rewarding, from this I have learned the variety of jobs and unpredictability of each day working as a curator.

I came to the North Herts Museum for my year 10 work experience, and I really enjoyed it. I learnt lots about how museums are run and got to see a lot of the behind the scenes whilst being allowed to help with the creation of a new exhibit and assist with setting up multiple displays including one about local sports events.

A 1990 boxing programme worked on by Erin, showing a match involving Hitchin’s Andy Straughn.

The experience was brilliant, and I loved seeing all around the museum and working with so many kind people. Seeing the displays around the museum allowed me to learn about local history and eras in time that I was unfamiliar with.

Doing my work experience here allowed me to see what I can do with my passion for history in the future and I now plan on studying it further. As well as that, it allowed me to grow my confidence in many areas and be more independent.

I am grateful I had this opportunity and thank the staff at the museum for their kindness and giving me the opportunity to do my work experience there.

For my year 10 work experience I got my placement at the North Hertfordshire Museum, located in Hitchin. During my week here I was fortunate to experience many different parts the museum that allows it to be able to fully function and educate people of all ages on the fascinating history of North Herts.

I was able to discover what it is like to sort through and log multiple artefacts and documents that have the potential to end up on display, during the week I worked on objects donated by the Offley Morris Men. I got the opportunity to learn about the Offley Morris Men, which I would never even known existed until I was gifted with the opportunity to look through and understand the history of the group.

A jug engrved with the details of Offley Morris Men.

Furthermore, whilst I was understanding the works of the museum, I got to spend some time at the front desk. I got to see how those who work at the desk interact with people, helping to improve, my skills interacting with others. I was lucky enough to have my work experience week land in the week where the museum hosted a Ukraine refugee coffee morning. I saw how the people in the museum care and work hard to help those who need it.