A group of IU Informatics alumni and students visited the The Children's Museum of Indianapolis to learn more about how technology is utilized by the Museum. It also generated ideas on how alumni might volunteer their time/talent and how Informatics students might gain internship experience.

• Develop new media shows for gallery space. If you have an idea for a gallery display or exhibit, pitch it to the Museum!
• Grant development ideas/writing. The Museum must have money before a project can start. Grant monies help.
• Video, animation, coding, lots of opportunity. The Museum's information technology is based on php, Windows, and Adobe products. There are several projects in need of development and coding.
• Capturing gallery media to content management system. There are many, many media items in various stages of use within the Museum's technology infrastructure. These items need organization, meta data added, etc.
• Project management. With so many projects, someone has to keep them on track toward milestones.
• Data collection, data analysis, metrics, etc. Many exhibits collect data on their interaction with visitors; this data needs analysis.
• Tech office hours for Museum staff to ask questions for various projects. These questions would most likely lead to project work.

Angie McNew and Ian Repp, from the Museum's Information Technology group, both said "there are more projects than staff/budget can handle". There is opportunity to learn. And while internship pay would be low, there are perks for being an intern. Contact Karla McLaughlin for question on internships at The Children's Museum.

Thanks to Karla McLaughlin, Rick Crossln, Angie McNew, and Ian Repp from The Children's Museum for tour and background on how technology is used at the Museum.

Pictures from The Children's Museum visit.

For full screen, click after starting player below.