- The Activist Museum Award
- Addressing the museum attendance and benefit gap
- Articulate
- Birmingham Museum Trust Vision
- Books connect 2
- Building inclusive museums
- Buried in the footnotes
- Cabinet of Curiosities
- A Catalyst for Change
- The Cinematic Musée Imaginaire of spatial cultural differences [CineMuseSpace]
- Contested Desires Constructive Dialogues
- Cultural activity within historic houses
- Developing learning advocates in the East Midlands
- Developing learning advocates in the North West
- Developing new audiences and promoting social inclusion
- Disorder, dissent and disruption
- Encountering the Unexpected
- Engage, learn, achieve
- Engaging archives with Inspiring Learning for All
- Engaging the City
- Cultural value of engaging with museums
- Cultural value of engaging with museums
- EuNaMus
- Evaluating Creativity
- Everyone Welcome 2019-2021
- Everywhere and Nowhere
- Exceptional & Extraordinary
- EXILE at Kingston Lacy
- Generic learning outcomes
- girl.boy.child
- Growing social role of botanic gardens
- HumanKind
- Impact of generic learning outcomes
- Imperial War Museum North
- Including Museums
- Inspiration, identity, learning: the value of museums
- Inspiration, identity, learning: the value of museums, second study
- Leaders in Co-creation?
- Learning impact research project
- Learning through Culture
- The Madonna of the pinks
- Making Meaning in Art Museums 1
- Making Meaning in Art Museums 2
- Mapping the change phase 2
- Mindful Museum
- Mirror
- Museu do Samba, Brazil
- Museums and an ageing population
- Museums and social inclusion: the GLLAM report
- Museums health and wellbeing
- Co-production Framework at National Museums Liverpool
- New Walk Museum vision
- Not for the likes of you
- Open House
- Open minds
- Participatory practices at the Science Museum
- Permissible Beauty
- Prejudice & Pride: exploring LGBTQ lives at the National Trust
- Prisoners, Punishment and Torture
- Redefining the Role of Botanic Gardens
- Research network to advance museum ethics
- Researching Learning in Museums and Galleries 1990-1999
- Rethinking Disability Representation
- shOUT
- Small museums and social inclusion
- Stories of a Different Kind
- Supporting Decolonial Futures
- Talking statues
- TCS project
- The Museum as a Space of Social Care
- The Queer Heritage and Collections Network
- Their Past Your Future 2
- Seeing the museum through the visitors’ eyes
- Trans-Inclusive Culture
- Museums and the Transgender Tipping Point
- Unfinished portrait at Felbrigg Hall
- “In the past we would just be invisible”
- What did you learn at the museum today?
- What did you learn at the museum today? Second study
- Return to the start of the menu
- RCMG
-
Research archive
- The Activist Museum Award
- Addressing the museum attendance and benefit gap
- Articulate
- Birmingham Museum Trust Vision
- Books connect 2
- Building inclusive museums
- Buried in the footnotes
- Cabinet of Curiosities
- A Catalyst for Change
- The Cinematic Musée Imaginaire of spatial cultural differences [CineMuseSpace]
- Contested Desires Constructive Dialogues
- Cultural activity within historic houses
- Developing learning advocates in the East Midlands
- Developing learning advocates in the North West
- Developing new audiences and promoting social inclusion
- Disorder, dissent and disruption
- Encountering the Unexpected
- Engage, learn, achieve
- Engaging archives with Inspiring Learning for All
- Engaging the City
- Cultural value of engaging with museums
- Cultural value of engaging with museums
- EuNaMus
- Evaluating Creativity
- Everyone Welcome 2019-2021
- Everywhere and Nowhere
- Exceptional & Extraordinary
- EXILE at Kingston Lacy
- Generic learning outcomes
- girl.boy.child
- Growing social role of botanic gardens
- HumanKind
- Impact of generic learning outcomes
- Imperial War Museum North
- Including Museums
- Inspiration, identity, learning: the value of museums
- Inspiration, identity, learning: the value of museums, second study
- Leaders in Co-creation?
- Learning impact research project
- Learning through Culture
- The Madonna of the pinks
- Making Meaning in Art Museums 1
- Making Meaning in Art Museums 2
- Mapping the change phase 2
- Mindful Museum
- Mirror
- Museu do Samba, Brazil
- Museums and an ageing population
- Museums and social inclusion: the GLLAM report
- Museums health and wellbeing
- Co-production Framework at National Museums Liverpool
- New Walk Museum vision
- Not for the likes of you
- Open House
- Open minds
- Participatory practices at the Science Museum
- Permissible Beauty
- Prejudice & Pride: exploring LGBTQ lives at the National Trust
- Prisoners, Punishment and Torture
- Redefining the Role of Botanic Gardens
- Research network to advance museum ethics
- Researching Learning in Museums and Galleries 1990-1999
- Rethinking Disability Representation
- shOUT
- Small museums and social inclusion
- Stories of a Different Kind
- Supporting Decolonial Futures
- Talking statues
- TCS project
- The Museum as a Space of Social Care
- The Queer Heritage and Collections Network
- Their Past Your Future 2
- Seeing the museum through the visitors’ eyes
- Trans-Inclusive Culture
- Museums and the Transgender Tipping Point
- Unfinished portrait at Felbrigg Hall
- “In the past we would just be invisible”
- What did you learn at the museum today?
- What did you learn at the museum today? Second study
Research Centre for Museums and Galleries (RCMG)
Growing the social role of botanic gardens
In spring 2010 RCMG completed a ground-breaking research project commissioned by Botanic Gardens Conservation International (BGCI), Redefining the role of Botanic Gardens: Towards a new social purpose. This identified that botanic gardens have the potential to have a far greater social role and connect with a more diverse audience than they do at present. The research found that there were a number of factors that inhibit change in botanic gardens, which are important to address if botanic gardens are to achieve their potential in raising awareness about the importance of plant diversity and the threat from climate change. Growing the Social Role of Botanic Gardens built on this research, working with botanic gardens to re-evaluate their mission within a framework of social responsibility and to develop socially relevant projects.
Aims and objectives
Supported by the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, BGCI worked with RCMG and three selected UK botanic gardens to examine their philosophy, values, goals and practices with the aim of realising their own potential to contribute toward positive social change and broad environmental awareness about climate change. Alongside a programme of workshops, two botanic gardens developed funded, small-scale research projects. These were:
- Urban Veg, a community based vegetable garden designed by Winterbourne House and Garden as a two way cultural exchange and learning experience for the Islamic communities of Birmingham and garden staff.
- Engaging Secondary Schools, a series of science-focused workshops run by Ness Botanic Garden for students from a deprived area of Liverpool.
Key findings
As a frank account of the realities and challenges of engaging with the social role of botanic gardens, Growing the Social Role stress tests the prevailing organisational cultures and structures of UK botanic gardens to see if they are fit for purpose for the 21st Century. Which is not to say that it's the working assumption of the report that the current model is exhausted and in need of revolution. Far from it, indeed, since the evidence is there for all to see that when they’re playing to their historical strengths and catering for their traditional audiences, the UK’s botanic gardens remain a potent force. But this begs the question: how much better would they be if, like our partner gardens here, they looked to engage with non-traditional audiences on globally significant issues such as global climate change and social and environmental justice? It is hoped that the learning that has come from the project will not only inform the practice of the botanic gardens involved but the wider botanic garden community too.
Outcomes
Growing the Social Role: Partnerships in the Community (Summary, 2011) (PDF, 3,317KB)
Let's Talk, A Case Study: Change Growth Impact (BGCI/RCMG) (Case study, undated) (PDF, 1,374KB)