The Jane S. Dutton Educational Resource Center is making changes in how it serves educators by employing new technologies. As of June 2008, the center will no longer loan resources and will instead focus on delivering web-based resources and on educational research.

Dutton Center Mission:

The new mission for the center is to create rich metadata facilitating access to the Museum's collections and digital assets, as well as the investigation of tools, techniques and research which leverages these resources to enhance the public’s engagement with art and artists.

New Directions for the Dutton Center:

The Dutton Center will change its focus to engage specifically in two new directions. First, the center will expand upon its historical roots in visual resources by facilitating access to the Museum's many digital assets. Digital photography of the collections and grounds, documentary video of art and artists, online video description and interpretation of digital, as well as the digitization of important and unique slide and video media, are a few examples of future projects. Specifically, this effort will focus on the creation and interrelation of metadata descriptions and cataloging of these media resources to create a web of connected information that can support the IMA's educational efforts about art and artists.

A second area of focus for the Dutton Center will include projects devoted to the tools, techniques and research needed by museum and school-based educators, as well as the public, to take advantage of these media resources and the IMA's collections. Dedication to an innovative approach for understanding how visitors and educators can use, process and understand the Museum's collections and digital content is required if the IMA hopes to be a catalyst for learning and meaningful experiences with art.

Projects focused on the visitor's experience in the galleries, or the role of social tagging and community voice as a tool for access to art, are two examples of user-centered research and applications that can serve as an important resource not only to the public, but also to educators inside and outside the museum as they develop engaging curriculum and interpretive resources that can make use of these new means of access and understanding.

In making these changes, the Dutton Center will foster collaboration among the education, registration and technology areas of the Museum. The use of technology will enable participation by new audiences without geographic limitations. This new focus of the Dutton Center's activities will align it with the Museum's evolving strategy for engaging audiences in the galleries, in classrooms and online.