Museum Membership
Professional Development
Museum Membership is an affordable way for museums to offer professional development and networking opportunities to their staff. It's a great way to show appreciation to your team when your conference travel budget is low.
Is your museum already enrolled? Need an invite for yourself or a colleague? Send this email.
Museum Membership Benefits
Museum Membership Key Facts
How it works
It’s free to get started. Register below to begin a free trial that will let you explore the community as a Museum Member. During the trial, you can even choose to begin inviting colleagues. We provide onboarding resources that you can use to share with your colleagues and invite them to join.
You can confirm your organization’s enrollment at any time by making payment for your membership. If you decide Museum Membership isn’t a good fit for your museum at the end of the trial period, just let your trial expire.
Eligibility
Museum Membership is open to all cultural organizations. This includes traditional museums as well as other cultural institutions such as zoos, aquaria, public gardens, arboreta, historic sites and societies, science centers, and other multi-disciplinary cultural organizations.
Participation
Each staff member you invite to the community can choose on a case-by-case basis which programs, courses, workshops, and events they would like to participate in. We invite museum members to special events occasionally, but no meetings or check-ins are required.
Fees
Museum membership fees are based on your organization’s annual operating budget.
| Annual Operating Budget | Yearly | Quarterly (Installments) |
|---|---|---|
| Less than $1MM | $176 | $48 |
| $1–2MM | $264 | $73 |
| $2–5MM | $440 | $121 |
| $5–10MM | $703 | $193 |
| $10–20MM | $1,055 | $290 |
| More than $20MM | $1,495 | $411 |
Financial data for most US-based cultural organizations can be found on CauseIQ’s website.
Program Leaders
Kyle Bowen
Kyle is the founder of Museums As Progress. He helps cultural organizations identify and achieve their strategic objectives through progress-space research.
Rosie Siemer
Rosie is the founder and CEO of FIVESEED and the author of Museum Membership Innovation. Rosie’s work focuses on empathic research, choice architecture, and the future of membership.
Print the factsheet for your colleagues.
Want to convince your boss (or your board) to support enrollment in the Museum Membership program?
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Participating Organizations
FAQ
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Museum Membership allows unlimited participation from your museum staff. Anyone with an email address from your museum's domain can join the community, and pricing does not fluctuate based on the number of participants you invite.
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Each participating staff member logs in at community.museumprogress.com using their work email address and creates their own password. This allows them to customize their profile and notification preferences.
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No action is required if a staff member leaves. The individual will automatically be placed on a free membership after a period of inactivity.
When new staff join your organization, you can forward them the link we provide you to invite them to sign up for the community as part of your Museum Membership team
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If you need more time, email us at community@museumprogress.com or send a direct message to Kyle Bowen on the community website. We’re happy to extend your free trial for you.
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Paying by credit card or installments (auto-renewal): One month before renewal, you will receive a reminder email that the card on file will be charged.
Paying by invoice: One month before renewal, you will receive an invoice via email; You’ll have 30 days to complete payment (via one-time credit/debit card payment, check, or ACH).
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You have a few options:
Request to pay by invoice. We’ll email you an invoice, and you can make a one-time payment for the year. To request an invoice, email community@museumprogress.com.
Once your card is charged for the first annual payment, cancel your membership under your account settings. Your organization will still be enrolled, but your card will not be charged for renewal.
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Yes. To arrange payment by invoice, complete the registration form and start a free trial. (You do not need to put in any credit card information.) Then, email community(at)museumprogress.com and let us know you’d like to pay by invoice.
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Paying by credit card: The person who started the trial can cancel under their account settings.
Paying by installment plan or invoice: Email us at community@museumprogress.com to cancel.
You and your team keep full access to program benefits until your billing cycle ends. Then, all your accounts convert to free individual memberships. You can renew your organization’s membership anytime.
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Yes. It’s up to you how you use your invites to the community — Just be sure each person uses their own individual work email address to create their account (jdoe@yourmuseum.org).
If, after you’ve registered, a colleague from another department begins a free trial, we will contact you and them to ensure both departments have access to the Museum Membership program. (We will not charge your organization for two museum memberships.)
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Yes. Be sure you and your colleagues all sign up using your work email addresses.
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Installment plans let you pay for a one-year Museum Membership over 12 months. Your organization is charged automatically every three months.
Due to technical constraints, you cannot cancel an installment plan in your account settings. However, if you email us (community@museumprogress.com), we will cancel your Museum Membership for you.
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We can cancel your paid individual membership and add you as a Museum Member. You’ll still have all your previous benefits, just no monthly or annual payments. We can even apply a prorated discount to your Museum Membership, deducting whatever amount remains on your Supporting Membership from your organization’s first payment.