Hello Dr. Mason:
As I’m sure you can guess, I’m writing to advocate for the Sternberg Museum of Natural History.
To say that the museum is irreplaceable, unique and powerfully supportive of both FHSU and the surrounding regions would be an understatement.
People travel internationally to visit the museum. The Sternberg family name resides in the names of multiple extinct species. Employees have been hired recently, relocating their lives to work at the world-famous Sternberg Museum of Natural History. Donors have contributed many tens of thousands of dollars towards research labs, libraries, etc. within the Sternberg.
I absolutely understand the rough fiscal state that Kansas’ universities are in. But to say with any seriousness that the Sternberg Museum should close suddenly and irreversibly without trying to address its financial woes is, to my mind, heinously unethical. It’s tremendously short-sighted.
For more than a century, FHSU has made promises to scientists, students, neighbors, and the global scientific community that it will accumulate, curate, care for and make accessible its specimens for the better of science and humanity, into perpetuity.
If there truly are issues with funding for operations or infrastructure, FHSU leadership has an obligation to creatively, passionately try to find ways to navigate the financial woes of today and tomorrow. Closing the museum should be the absolute last step, not the first.
Various sources online state that the ROI of museums in small communities range between 500% and 1,200%. I’d wager that the Sternberg is on the higher end of that for at least three reasons:
• Proximity to I-70, especially with its eye-catching dome.
• The museum is the sole entity of its type between Lawrence and Denver.
• SMNH punches above its weight class, compared to other museums of its size and budget.
Disregarding the scientific value of the Sternberg for a moment, closing it would still be a gut punch to the local economy and culture of Hays and the surrounding counties. Tax revenue from travelers would diminish, as will revenue on food and lodging. The families who rely on it for meaningful, engaging entertainment and education will suffer, and those children will be less likely to be recruited into FHSU or to stay in the community.
The FHSU Foundation recently posted on Facebook advertising the opening of the new Bickle-Schmidt Athletic Complex. The VAST majority of comments advocate for the support of the museum over athletics. FHSU leadership should be guiding the foundation to fundraise for the raise $11.5 million for a sports facility is hypocritical and shows poor alignment with FHSU’s Mission Statement. The Sternberg is one of the university’s greatest assets for providing “accessible quality education to Kansas, the nation, and the world through an innovative community of teacher-scholars and professionals to develop engaged global citizen-leaders.”
A couple of stats I find most interesting are:
• 25% of football players suffer long-term brain damage whereas 75% of museum goers report expansion of their minds, perspectives and knowledge.
• 65% of adult Americans think collegiate sports are important compared to 84%-97% that think museums are important.
As of the writing of this letter, a petition to save the museum has 11,962 signatures on it from just the last few days. Considering that with the aforementioned outcry on Facebook, the community is behind the Sternberg.
Folks are willing to help and support the museum, even if the museum itself needs to restructure or reprioritize in some way. The lack of public communication and outreach by university leadership to try to mend these budget woes frames a stark picture of either ignorance, indifference or malice.
I am positive there are ways to work around this, at least for a few years, to navigate budgetary woes into the future. Partnerships with local governments and NGO’s are worthwhile. Restructuring to have a philanthropy leader at the museum could be very helpful. Historically, there have been many grants such as Mid-scale Research Infrastructure-2 (Mid-scale RI-2): This track specifically supports implementation projects with a total cost ranging from $20 million to $100 million.
We can hope that such funding comes alive again in the future, but it also shows that a purported $20 million in deferred maintenance is merely the result of negligence.
Surely the museum could have found funding over the last two decades to keep up with maintenance had the Foundation and university leadership creatively looked.
In closing, the dissolution of the Sternberg Museum of Natural History should be the absolute last step in solving budgetary woes, not the first. The lack of effort to elicit public input or other outside help casts a grave shadow on university leadership, and could leave an everlasting pall on the legacy of the current administration.
More importantly, closing the museum will be a permanent loss for the communities of western Kansas alongside the international scientific community. Fort Hays State University will ever be blighted by such a shameful lack of effort. Please, do more to help the Sternberg become more for future generations.
— Dexter R. Mardis,
Biological Field Station manager
Wichita State University