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National-Louis University

The Leadership Practice of Museum Educators

Abstract

dc:description.abstract

<p>This grounded theory study is an examination of the culture, context, conditions and competencies of a set of six museum educators from a large city in the United States. Participants were education department leaders from a variety of museum types, including: A science museum, an ethnic arts museum, a settlement house museum, a children‘s museum, an aquarium, and a zoo. An analysis of data points to an emerging framework that codifies particular leadership settings and domains of practice for leaders of museum educators. An array of data collections were employed in the study, including: Semi-structured interviews, unstructured observations, written reflections to assigned readings, and professional development workshops. Primary source documents were also analyzed as part of this study. Research suggests that highly skilled leaders of museum educators possess an ability to lead in a variety of settings including leading IN their departments, UP the institutional hierarchy, ACROSS the institution and OUTside the institution. An emerging framework is articulated that includes four domains of leadership practice: The Teaching and Learning Domain, the Political Domain, the Financial Domain and the Operations Domain. Lastly, research suggests that the participants in this study share a common lens through which all their work is done, which is that of the visitor as a learner. </p>

Degree

thesis:*
Name thesis:degree_name
Ed.D. Doctor of Education
Level thesis:degree_level
Dissertation - Public Access
Discipline thesis:degree_discipline
Educational Leadership
Year dc:date.available
2011

Author and committee

dc:creator, dc:contributor.*
Author dc:creator
  • Nolan, Tina R
Contributors dc:contributor
  • Linda Tafel, Ed.D.
  • Linnea Rademaker, Ph.D.
  • Patrick Roberts, Ph.D.

Subjects

dc:subject × 7

Identifiers

dc:identifier.*
Repository record dc:identifier
https://digitalcommons.nl.edu/diss/99
OAI identifier oai:identifier
oai:digitalcommons.nl.edu:diss-1100

Chain of custody

source
Harvested from
National-Louis University
Base URL
digitalcommons.nl.edu/do/oai/
Last updated
2026-07-24
Source record
OAI-PMH GetRecord
citation

Nolan, Tina R. The Leadership Practice of Museum Educators. Dissertation - Public Access thesis, 2011. https://digitalcommons.nl.edu/diss/99