Careers

Posted February 22, 2023

Eligibility: New Haven Promise scholars who will have their bachelor's degree by summer 2023

The Yale Center for British Art (YCBA), the New Haven Museum (NHM), and the Yale Peabody Museum (YPM) invite applicants for a two-year Postgraduate Associate position in the field of museum education. This position is intended for individuals interested in exploring a career in this field. Museum educators come from many different professional backgrounds, and they typically need both knowledge of their museum’s subject area and familiarity with pedagogy. The position is designed to offer opportunities for growth in both content knowledge and object-based teaching strategies. After the two-year program, the Postgraduate Associate will be well positioned to further their work in museum education.

This position will introduce the field as well as provide hands-on experience teaching and learning in the museum environment. It is designed to expose the individual to a broad range of museum education practices, including but not limited to programs for K–12 schools, undergraduate college and university students, after-school and youth groups, neurodiverse children and adults, and the public. The Postgraduate Associate will rotate through the Yale Center for British Art, the New Haven Museum, and the Yale Peabody Museum during their two-year appointment. Over the course of the position term, the individual will be mentored by staff in the three museum education departments and will have the opportunity to engage with other post-baccalaureate fellows on the Yale campus.

Participating Museums

Yale Center for British Art

The Yale Center for British Art (YCBA) is the largest and most comprehensive collection of British art outside the United Kingdom. The YCBA’s collections of paintings, sculpture, and works on paper (which include archives, drawings, manuscripts, photographs, prints, and rare books) present the story of British art and culture, and its global contexts, from the fifteenth century to today. An extensive reference library is available to the staff and public to support research on the collections, British art, and their histories.

The YCBA’s exhibition of the permanent collection provides an overview of British art, history, and culture over six centuries. It is the subject of research by postdoctoral associates, visiting scholars, and graduate and undergraduate students. The YCBA also runs numerous outreach programs, events, and programs for students from elementary school to college and offers a robust menu of enrichment programs to all teachers in visual literacy, curricular issues, and how to use the museum as an extension of the classroom. Special exhibitions also take place throughout the year on a rotating basis. The Education Department designs and creates object-based programs for these exhibitions to enhance visitors’ understanding of their themes and help relate them to the permanent collections.

The Postgraduate Associate will have the opportunity to work with all members of the Education Department as well as other museum staff to create object-based initiatives and programs for schools and members of the greater New Haven community. The Postgraduate Associate will gain hands-on experience building both in-gallery and classroom curricula, researching objects in the collection, developing tours for school-age children and adults, and participating in the many public programs the YCBA offers. The YCBA will serve as the Postgraduate Associate’s first host site, full-time during the 2023–2024 academic year and part-time once they are additionally stationed at the NHM. Occasional weekend and evening hours will be required.

New Haven Museum

The New Haven Museum (NHM) is a vibrant center for exploring the people, places, events, and ideas that shape and define the Elm City. Founded in 1862 as the New Haven Colony Historical Society to preserve the history and heritage of the greater New Haven region, in recent years it has “emerged from the pewter age” with an array of timely exhibitions, programs, collections, research, and outreach activities that connect with community through collaboration and co-creation. The museum’s collections date to the early years of the New Haven Colony and include more than ten thousand decorative and fine art objects; an extensive photographic archive of more than 75,000 prints, negatives, and film; and the holdings of the Whitney Library, which exceed 30,000 volumes and 320 manuscript collections, as well as architectural drawings, maps, broadsides, newspapers, and other items. Each year, school programs for K–12 students connect 1,700 children and teens with local history. The museum also serves as the regional contest coordinator for Connecticut History Day. The NHM is the steward of two historic buildings: its 1930 Colonial Revival-style headquarters at 114 Whitney Avenue, and the Pardee-Morris House (PMH), ca. 1780, located on the East Shore and open seasonally. Summer offerings include outdoor concerts, book talks, Morris Cove Day, house tours, and colonial games and crafts. Overall, the museum welcomes more than ten thousand visitors every year (pre-COVID-19).

During summer 2024, the Postgraduate Associate will spend part of each week at the New Haven Museum and Pardee-Morris House. The position will focus on education and public programming at both museum locations as well as community events. The Postgraduate Associate will facilitate tours of the exhibits for a range of audiences (school-age to adult), assist the Education Director and PMH Coordinator with on-site programming, develop visit materials for school programs and museum visitors, and participate in community outreach. Regular weekend and evening hours will be required.

Yale Peabody Museum

One of the oldest and largest university-based natural history museums in the world, the Yale Peabody Museum (YPM) stewards more than fourteen million items that inform our understanding of Earth, its life, history, and cultures. The collections, many of historical and global significance, include specimens from the fields of paleontology, zoology, botany, and mineralogy, as well as ethnographic and archaeological objects and historical scientific instruments. They play a prominent role in cutting-edge research worldwide and form the basis of exhibitions and educational programs for Yale and public audiences. The Peabody’s public exhibitions and galleries are currently under major renovation and scheduled to reopen in early 2024, but many programs continue during the renovation.

YPM educational programs serve a broad and diverse audience across four areas of focus. The Public Programs office is responsible for a wide range of events and programs open to the public, including summer camps, lectures, sleepovers, science nights, and two major annual celebrations: Fiesta Latina! and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Legacy of Social and Environmental Justice. The School and Group Programs team provides content-rich, object-based programs for approximately twenty thousand individuals each year, at every educational level including pre-K–12, college, and adults, with more than half presented free to New Haven and West Haven schools. The EVOLUTIONS Afterschool Program engages one hundred New Haven and West Haven public high school students in out-of-school learning that spans all four years of high school and beyond. Sci.CORPS, an affiliated career ladder program, offers EVOLUTIONS students and alumni real-world paid work experience and rigorous training as science communicators at the museum. Finally, the Student Programs office supports the teaching and learning mission of Yale University by connecting more than 1,500 Yale students each year with YPM collections through object study classroom sessions, collections tours, and field-based learning opportunities as part of their coursework.

The Postgraduate Associate will have the opportunity to join projects and initiatives across all areas of YPM education beginning in the fall of 2024. Projects will be matched to the individual’s specific interests and desired areas for growth and professional development. The annual programming cycle, as well as the renovation completion schedule, will determine the timing and availability of projects and initiatives. Occasional weekend and evening hours will be required.

Eligibility

Any current or former New Haven Promise scholar with a bachelor’s degree is eligible for the position regardless of undergraduate major, though preference may be given to graduates with majors in communications, education, or any of the fields related to the collections of the three museums. Yale College graduates are not eligible to apply.

Applicants must indicate in their CVs that they are current or former New Haven Promise scholars.

Salary Range: $45,000 - $53,000

To apply, please email a cover letter, CV, and contact information for two professional references to ycba.education@yale.edu. The application deadline is Wednesday, March 15.

Posted January 31, 2023

The Yale Peabody Museum (YPM) stewards more than 14 million items that inform our understanding of Earth, its life, history, and cultures. The collections, many of historical and global significance, include specimens from the fields of paleontology, zoology, botany and mineralogy, as well as ethnographic and archaeological objects and historical scientific instruments.

The YPM Office of Student Programs was established to support teaching and research at Yale University, and to coordinate and foster the engagement of Yale students in the activities of YPM across all its departments and divisions. The YPM Student Programs Postdoctoral Associate (SPPA) will be involved in the broad range of responsibilities and activities of the Student Programs Office. As an academic museum, we have the unique opportunity to provide object-based learning experiences for over 75 Yale courses per year through engagement with YPM collections, exhibitions, and our curators and staff. In addition, the Student Programs Office provides exceptional field-based learning experiences on Yale’s nearby natural properties, especially Horse Island. We also coordinate 10+ research internships every summer for Yale undergraduates, and many more undergraduate and graduate students are involved with research in the YPM collections during the academic year.

With a specific focus on teaching and research at Yale, the SPPA will likely split most of their effort between the provision of object-based learning and the support of collections-based student research. In certain cases, the SPPA may have the opportunity to advise on or co-develop course-related projects or curricula with faculty and/or staff. The SPPA will also work closely with YPM staff in Communications and Public Programs to help develop and promote student-generated exhibits, videos, podcasts, animations, images, visualizations, and other means of communicating science to a broad audience. The SPPA will have the opportunity to work with a wide range of YPM staff to develop and/or administer new or existing initiatives involving Yale students. The SPPA will work with the Director and Assistant Director of Student Programs to determine the scope of work that is the best combination of their skills and abilities and their desired areas of growth and training.

The SPPA will have the opportunity to gain experience and training in the following areas:

• Yale teaching and course support
• object-based and exhibit-based teaching pedagogy
• field-based teaching pedagogy
• supporting Yale student research
• supporting summer internship programs
• mentoring students in various forms of science communication
• extracurricular student engagement
• collaborative program development with YPM staff
• engagement and collaboration with other University museums and departments
• collections handling, storage, and data management practices

This position is for doctoral graduates seeking to explore careers that support undergraduate and graduate student education and research in academic museums. The SPPA appointment will be for one year with the expectation to renew for a second year.

Applicants should submit a curriculum vitae, names and contact information for three references, and a cover letter expressing their interest and qualifications to david.heiser@yale.edu. We are committed to increasing diversity, equity, accessibility and inclusion in the museum field. Qualified candidates from underrepresented groups are highly encouraged to apply.

We will begin reviewing applications March 1, 2023

Expected start date: July 1, 2023

Annual compensation is $62,000 plus a competitive benefits package, including health insurance. For more details, see https://postdocs.yale.edu/postdocs/benefits.

At the Yale Peabody Museum we are working on Diversity, Equity, Accessibility, and Inclusion institutional priorities so that we can learn to better serve our communities, amplify marginalized voices and perspectives, and create a welcoming and inclusive environment for all. The ideal candidate will be ready to share their experience with and interest in contributing to this work. Please address in your cover letter how Diversity, Equity, Accessibility, and Inclusion relate to your professional experience and goals.

Yale University considers applicants for employment without regard to and does not discriminate on the basis of an individual’s sex, race, color, religion, age, disability, status as a veteran, or national or ethnic origin; nor does Yale discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity or expression.