Our latest Coffee Gathering was with Dana Carlisle Kletchka, an Assistant Professor of Art Museum Education in the Department of Arts Administration, Education, and Policy at The Ohio State University. Her research areas include post-critical art museum education theory; professional development for PreK–12 teachers in art museum contexts; the use of social media and digital technologies on interpretation and engagement in the art museum; and the professional positionality of art museum educators within the profound paradigmatic shift of art museums over the last 40 years. In 2015, she was awarded the National Art Education Association’s Art Educator of the Year for the Museum Education division.
Over the past 20 years, she held professional education positions as Curator of Education at the Palmer Museum of Art at The Pennsylvania State University, as an Affiliate Assistant Professor in the School of Visual Arts, and as co-director of the Summer Institute of Contemporary Art (SICA), a joint project of SoVA and the Palmer Museum of Art. She was also the Coordinator of Docent and Interpretive Programs at The Philbrook Museum of Art in Tulsa, OK, and a Curatorial Intern in Art Museum Education at the Spencer Museum of Art, University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS.
She is the co-editor and co-author of the recently published book Professional Development in Art Museums: Strategies of Engagement Through Contemporary Art with B. Stephen Carpenter, II.
Professional Development in Art Museums: Strategies of Engagement Through Contemporary Art explores the research and practice of professional development for preK-12 teachers in art museums, with emphasis on curricular possibilities, conceptual considerations, historical precedents, learner-centered teaching, critical teaching strategies, and communities of practice. Three sections fill this book with examples, strategies, and possibilities for educators interested in enriching teaching and learning in conversation with the art and issues of our times.
In this innovative anthology, co-editors Dana Carlisle Kletchka and B. Stephen Carpenter, II have compiled translations and examinations of theory and practice at the intersection of collaborative professional development, art museums, and contemporary art. To this end, a diverse group of art educators and art museum educators add to a growing body of knowledge about the purposeful reflections and dialogues, inspiring curricula, and innovative pedagogies that inform professional development experiences in art museum contexts.
