Cooperstown Graduate Program

The Cooperstown Campus: Students in this full-time, residential program attend classes in Cooperstown, a village 25 miles northeast of Oneonta. They benefit from small class sizes and a high faculty-to-student ratio. This allows students to get to know and work closely with professors, who are leaders and innovators in the field. The Mid-Atlantic Association of Museums and the headquarters of New York State History Day are on the CGP campus and provide students with opportunities to network with professionals and refine their skills. Although CGP itself is a small program, as an academic departament of SUNY Oneonta, its students have access to all the resources of a much larger state university system. Real-world projects with partner institutions including the Dyckman Farmhouse Museum, the Arkell Museum, Hanford Mills Museum, Hyde Hall State Historic Site, the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum, and the Little Falls Historical Society extend the CGP learning environment still further.

Museum Studies, M.A.

Program history: Founded in 1964, the Cooperstown Graduate Program is one of the oldest museum studies graduate programs in the country. Many of its more than 1,000 alumni have attained prominence in museums and related fields as directors, educators, curators, or programming specialists. In 2011, CGP moved into its new home, one of the only buildings in the world designed specifically for museum studies. A few years later, in 2015, the history museum studies curriculum was expanded to include a science museum studies track. The science museum studies track is the first master’s program of its kind in the United States. Both the history and science tracks have generalist curriculums, so students explore many aspects of museum work.

Program Mission: The Cooperstown Graduate Program trains creative, entrepreneurial museum leaders committed to programs for the public good.

Premises:

Museums should be essential community institutions dedicated to community service.
Museum boards, staffs, collections, and programs should reflect the diversity of their communities and be welcoming to and respectful of all people. Our diversity is a strength.
Museum experiences focus on human interactions and storytelling. We use ideas, artifacts, living collections, media, and phenomena as catalysts for social discourse.
Museum work is grounded in curiosity and scholarship—the study of science, history, art, and culture. CGP graduates are scholar professionals dedicated to services and programs supported by research.
Successful museums operate with the discipline of business and simultaneously balance money and mission to ensure institutional sustainability and a rich quality of life in their communities.

Non-Profit Leadership Certificate of Advanced Study

Program purposes: Non-profit Leadership is an advanced graduate certificate program geared to people working or serving in the cultural sector who want to learn new skills and supplement their knowledge of strategies and policies. Coursework will enable students to succeed as leaders and managers within their institutions as they advance in their professional journeys and take on new leadership challenges. The certificate will prepare students for roles as executive directors, senior managers, board members, and other administrative positions. The program will give students tools and strategies for working wisely and effectively in areas including boards and governance, finance, human resources, fundraising, and strategic planning. Courses, geared to working professionals, are taught in a distance learning format by leaders in the field.

Programs

Master of Arts

Certificate of Advanced Study

Non-Profit Leadership, Advanced Graduate Certificate