Widga says the museum is there to serve the interests of the college; it’s there to help researchers continue their work. Because it’s visited by K-12 students, it’s there to help them discover majors within the college. His vision is to advance on these fronts while expanding the collection to better represent modern research in EMS. That includes meteorology and atmospheric science, geography and AI, energy and sustainability, and materials science and engineering.
Based on the fossil records, the 3D art exhibit imagines what a Cretaceous ocean would have looked like. To create it, Horisk and Lau worked with museum leaders — including former interim museum director Julianne Snider and curator Patti Wood Finkle — to craft a theme. Lau wrote the informational text and she, along with Horisk, tested prototypes with students taking undergraduate level geosciences courses.
With goals of educating students about sustainability and creating a more sustainable campus environment, the Student Sustainability Council in the Penn State College of Earth and Mineral Sciences (EMS) is developing a new museum series highlighting sustainability efforts taking place in the college.
The Penn State Museum Consortium will be holding the spring 2023 "Night at the Museums" on April 20. Participating museums on the University Park campus will be open from 5 to 8 p.m. This is a chance for students, staff, faculty and the community to visit a variety of unique and interesting museums across campus for a special evening event. Admittance to the museums is free and open to the public.
"From the moment I first walked into the Earth and Mineral Sciences Museum and Art Gallery on Penn State’s University Park campus, I became transfixed with the exhibits. Stones that bend, dinosaur feet, and fluorescent minerals are just some of the specimens that can be found in the one-room museum in Deike Building. As a life-long natural history lover I was fascinated by all of that, but what really captured my attention was the art." Read the article >>
“Hidden Landscapes: An Exploration of Earth’s Mantle” will open from 3 to 4 p.m. Oct. 4 in the Earth and Mineral Sciences Museum and Art Gallery in the ground floor of the Deike Building. The exhibit was created by an undergraduate student within the college of EMS.
Patti Wood Finkle, the new collections manager of the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences' Museum & Art Gallery, said she enjoys taking deep dives into finding the history behind items where she often starts with little information. She brings to the museum experience in archaeology, paleontology and geology collections.
The Earth and Mineral Sciences (EMS) Museum & Art Gallery has secured the fourth in a series of grants totaling $450,000 from the Institute for Museum and Library Services, which will be used to continue the effort to securely store some of the museum’s collections.
Steel towns. Mines. Factories. Places like these, once the lifeblood of the industrial economy in Pennsylvania, have since become artifacts of our state's history.
The Earth and Mineral Sciences (EMS) Museum and Art Gallery on the ground floor of Deike Building at University Park will extend its hours to be open prior to Penn State home football games.