This week the FLMNH hosted the annual Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collections’ conference. I was lucky enough to be able to both volunteer at and attend the event.

Through attending the conference, I was able to see many interesting talks regarding museum collections. I was especially interested in seeing talks regarding outreach and advocacy. I watched talks that described how museum specimens can be used to teach all types of people, from small children to people with disabilities. These presentations have inspired me to think about how we can use museum collections as more than sources of data for researchers, but as tools to instill an appreciation of science into the public. Overall the SPNHC meeting was a great experience and I got to meet many interesting people from all sorts of natural history museum related careers.