The Natural History Museum Signed an MOU with Mapo District Family Center
- Date2023.09.22
- 12481
Ewha Womans University Natural History Museum (Director: Professor Joong-Ki Park) and Mapo District Family Center (Director: Yeojin Choi) signed an MOU on September 20th to construct a system for providing community-engaged education programs.
Since May, the Natural History Museum has provided education programs for sharing community values as a part of the University Innovation Support Project. Environment education and culture programs utilizing exhibitions and artworks at the Natural History Museum are provided to school-age children who are educationally marginalized or from multicultural families, and living in Seodaemun, Mapo, and Eunpyeong districts. Such programs facilitate not only the residents’ liberal learning but also community engagement.
This MOU was signed to provide the education programs by the Natural History Museum to wider demographics of Mapo district residents, based on high participant satisfaction and demands for the education programs.
Both institutions will cooperate for better relationships and communication within families and community development by offering education for a sustainable society by gradually extending education programs for families and experience-based programs for long-term residents and families with upper elementary schoolers living in Mapo District.
“I hope this MOU can be an opportunity for everyone to reflect on how distinguished resources at the university museum can be used for community, as well as an opportunity for mutual development of both institutions by reaching out to the local community,” said Joong-Ki Park, the director of the Natural History Museum.
“It is so meaningful that Mapo District Family Center can now reach out to more members of the community by signing the MOU with Ewha Womans University Natural History Museum, which is in Seodaemun District, as well as being able to offer valuable resources and high-quality programs of the Natural History Museum to the residents of Mapo District,” said Yeojin Choi, the director of Mapo District Family Center.
Ewha Womans University Natural History Museum, established in 1969 and became a venue for education and research of Korean natural history as Korea’s first natural history museum, has provided various community-engaged education programs. Education programs for children and teenagers raised citizens’ accessibility and satisfaction with the university museum. In addition, the Natural History Museum has strived to collect, research, and preserve the urochordata resources in Korea, since being designated as an organization for keeping, registering, and preserving deposited urochordata resources in 2019. It has also provided special co-exhibition on endangered species and climate-sensitive biological indicator species, aiming to promote preservation of national biodiversity and management of bioindicators to citizens, as a member of Biorepository Council consisting of national research institutions including the National Institute of Biological Resources (Ministry of Environment), the National Marine Biodiversity Institute of Korea (Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries), and the National Science Museum (Ministry of Science and ICT).