The UNESCO Office in Costa Rica and the Latin American Museums Institute (ILAM) have recently developed a new CD-rom tutorial aimed at helping museum professionals work closely with local communities to promote cultural and economic development. The tutorial, entitled “Museums committed to their local heritage: a manual for self-training, self-assessment and obtaining a certification”, is a valuable, and easy-to-use tool for increasing capacities, evaluating museum functions and offering certification in different regions.

The CD tutorial contains three main areas:

1) A virtual self-training for museum professionals with no access to physical training options;

2) A self-assessment process for museums regarding their actual impact on local heritage through carrying out joint actions with their communities;

3) Working sheets with practical information for those institutions interested in making the effort of having a positive impact on their local heritage through the joint work with their communities.

In addition, the tutorial includes the possibility of obtaining a Certification for “Best Practices for Institutions committed to their local heritage”.

Currently available in Spanish, the tutorial can be used by museums, houses of culture and cultural centers as well as by community groups. Over the past two years, the CD-rom has been tested by museum professionals and local communities in Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica. It has proven useful in evaluating museum functions through auto-evaluation and increasing capacities through an interactive tutorial on working with local communities.

“We are aiming to further test this tool at up to 50 national, regional and community museums in Latin America and the Caribbean, Spain and Equatorial Guinea,” said Montserrat Martell Domingo, Senior Cultural Specialist at the UNESCO Office in Costa Rica. “Following the findings of this evaluation, we hope to develop other language versions of the CD-rom so that museums around the world can use this tool to increase their collaborations with local communities.”

For more information on this project, please contact Ms Martell Domingo

Visualise the CD-rom here: Museums committed to their local heritage: a manual for self-training, self-assessment and obtaining a certification (in Spanish only)