The Jim Blackaby Ingenuity Award was introduced in New Orleans at the 2004 MUSE awards ceremony. Jim Blackaby, a board member of the Media and Technology Committee, passed away in the summer of 2003. Jim influenced many in the museum world with his innovative work in information services and Internet strategies. Conceived in his memory, this award recognizes a project that exemplifies the power of creative imagination in the use of media and technology—a project that has a powerful effect on its audience, and one that stands above the others in inventiveness and quality. The winner is selected from submissions to the MUSE awards of all categories and does not necessarily have to be a winner within the category to which it was submitted.
The judges said:
This truly innovative project is far more than a website: it is an interactive immigrant-education and community acculturation tool! The Frist Museum of Art
collaborated with Nashville's public library and a plethora of community and immigrant service organizations, with funding from the IMLS. Starting with ESL
classes in local neighborhoods and building through a series of eight lessons during which immigrants get to tell their own stories in picture form and
use their adopted language to describe them, then post them to a virtual gallery on the Web, Project Access culminates with visits to the physical
Museum and Library and hands-on lessons in how to use these community resources. By the end of the course, not only have these new immigrants learned
essential lessons about their adopted hometown, narrated their own stories and assimilated new field-specific vocabulary and processes (like looking
up and checking out books), they have also learned to surf and create for the Web and can share their own works with friends and family right alongside
those of the Museum and Library: a rare marriage of project goals that integrates real world experience/teaching with an online presence and empowers
those most likely to be disenfranchised by the Digital Divide. A great example of how, through collaboration, a museum can act as an agent of change.
The producers said:
Project Access, funded by The Institute of Museum and Library Services, is a collaborative two-year program between the Frist Center for the Visual Arts and
the Nashville Public Library. The goal of Project Access is to help increase adult English Language Learners' (ELL) skills in language, visual art and
computer literacy. The eight-visit program offers participants from local community service institutions the opportunity to engage in art-making,
computer-based learning, museum and library visits. The website, www.projectaccess.org, designed by Little Planet Learning, a Nashville technology
company, is an important component of the program. The website allows participants to gain computer skills and helps promote the program to a wider
audience. A special feature of this website allows Project Access participants and visitors to the Frist Center to access their artwork that is stored
in a digital portfolio and to write an accompanying personal narrative. Other key aspects of the website include a Red Grooms' inspired character on the
home page as the site host, the audio word bank to help ELL with pronunciation, lesson plans, evaluation tools, program outcomes, picture dictionary pages,
and art galleries with participants' artwork and narratives. All of these features are intended to make the learner feel more comfortable with the
Frist Center, the Public Library, art concepts, the English language, and computer applications.
Producer's Tips: A focus group of representatives from the community service institutions at the beginning of the program was instrumental in shaping the
curriculum and website design. Student participants during beta testing assisted with refining both the learning objectives and design of the
interactive elements. A response section for participants to send and receive e-mail updates could be an effective addition to the website.
Project Access