Marquette once had four minor programs with the Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design available to students. That number has since halved. Now students hope with the help of a committee that the partnership will grow and prosper.
Marquette sponsored an “MU/MIAD Mash-Up” event at the downtown MIAD building this past Saturday. The event offered tours of MIAD’s facilities and a hands-on screen printing workshop for attendees.
The Haggerty Museum of Art Student Advisory Committee was formed last summer and planned the mash-up to spark interest in Marquette’s collaboration with MIAD. The university offers graphic design and studio art minors which allows students to take MIAD classes alongside their regular classes.
Members of the committee’s executive board said this is the first collaboration of its kind. While Marquette and MIAD have collaborated for several years, allowing students to co-op with both schools, this is the first time Marquette has taken a step forward to cement this alliance.
Max Buckle, treasurer of the Haggerty Museum of Art Student Advisory Committee and a junior in the College of Business Administration, said he has seen student demand grow for fine arts programs on Marquette’s campus. Currently, Marquette’s established arts programs are the theatre arts major and minor as well as film, dance, music, creative writing and visual art minors. He also said there isn’t enough freshmen-targeted advertising for the programs.
“There hasn’t been a whole lot of communication; it hasn’t been strong between these two schools,” Buckle said. “I know when I was a freshman, or even when I was applying, I didn’t know about MIAD. It didn’t show up until later in my time here.”
Lynne Shumow, the Haggerty Museum curator for academic engagement, sponsors the Student Advisory Committee. Shumow said that while the museum has catered to student needs since its first opening in 1983, the new student-led committee will let students “have a voice” and make it easier to have direct communication between artistic leaders, students and museum staff. She said she hopes the collaboration will lead to bigger, better things in the future between Marquette and MIAD.
“I hope it leads to more collaborations between our students and MIAD students,” she said. “I hope it leads to a better understanding of the (studio art) minor. I’m hoping to enhance it.”
Connor O’Neill, a junior in the College of Arts & Sciences, is pursuing a minor in studio art. He said he believes the benefits of increasing the availability of creative arts programs would be “immeasurable.”
O’Neill said he learned a lot from his experiences in MIAD cross-registration because it helped him break out of the “Marquette bubble.” Even so, he said he believes that the communication between Marquette and MIAD has a long way to go.
“I’d like to see more relationships that are of a tighter-knit variety,” O’Neill said. “I think we’re close geographically, but we’re distant in terms of our mindsets.”
Shumow mentioned the possibility of a second event in the same style as the Saturday mash-up, except MIAD students would come to Marquette’s campus. Shumow said some students may have an interest in Marquette’s programs, like theology, that aren’t accessible at MIAD.
“Our students have things to offer that maybe the MIAD students don’t, and vice versa,” Shumow said. “I just think, together, there’s just such interesting things that could happen.”
