Brunel Museum on Tour Volunteers
Background
The Brunel Museum is dedicated to the Thames Tunnel – one of the greatest Victorian engineering achievements and the first successful underwater tunnel in the world. In September 2024, the Museum will begin a large-scale Lottery-funded renovation of its permanent gallery, and will close to visitors until summer 2025. In this time, we will seek to engage audiences outside the Museum with a new programme, ‘Brunel Museum on Tour’.
Our volunteers are crucial to the museum and will be key to developing and maintaining our audiences during closure. Brunel Museum on Tour volunteers will lead on delivering our new interactive experience that brings the stories of the Thames Tunnel to life. In this role you will help visitors to learn more about the workers – miners, bricklayers, carpenters, and more – who built the Thames Tunnel. Using clothing, props, dress-up items and other objects you will explore the lives of the real people who constructed the Thames Tunnel and their fascinating history.
The project will be a self contained experience that can easily travel to a range of different venues locally: from libraries to children’s centres to festivals.
This is a unique opportunity to gain meaningful, developmental experience to further explore your interest in the arts, while exploring what a career in the sector might look like.
Help us build our audiences and provide a fun and engaging experience to all, whilst gaining practical experience within an accredited Museum!
Your duties will include:
- Attending at least one training or shadowing session (first training scheduled for 14 Sept. 2024)
- Supporting Brunel Museum on Tour sessions with the public
Conditions
This is a flexible role that can be flexed to fit around what you’ve got going on.
Please specify your availability and preferred location in your application
About you
We are looking for people who:
- Are interested in developing their knowledge of the Thames Tunnel
- Enjoy speaking to people from a range of different backgrounds
- Are able to travel around and within Southwark
What we can offer
- A friendly, supportive environment and an opportunity to learn about the Brunels and the Thames Tunnel (no prior knowledge required)
- An award-winning team of museum volunteers
- Volunteer buddy system with existing volunteers welcoming and supporting new volunteers in their roles
- Training opportunities through attending external courses and receiving in-house training relevant to your role
- Volunteers get-togethers and thank you events
- Flexibility and volunteer shifts to suit your availability
- Opportunities to share your views and provide suggestions / input.
- An occasion to give back to the community
- Valuable experience at an accredited museum for your career development
Any questions about the role should be directed to the Collections Access Coordinator, Jack Hayes, in the first instance, via hello@thebrunelmuseum.com
Deadline: Please send a brief CV and a covering letter to hello@thebrunelmuseum.com.
We will assess applications on a rolling basis.
If successful, we will invite you for an informal conversation about the role, and you will be invited for a training session.
The first training session is scheduled to take place for this role on 14 September 2024. Please let us know on your application if you are available this date.
The Brunel Museum, Railway Avenue, London, SE16 4LF
Please note that The Brunel Museum is committed to equal opportunities in employment and ensuring that no one is denied opportunities or discriminated against through prejudice or exclusion due to characteristics protected under the Equality Act. The successful candidate will be subject to an enhanced disclosure from the Disclosure & Barring Service and appropriate references.
If you have a disability which means you are unable to meet some of the job requirements, specifically because of your disability, please address this in your application. If you meet all the other criteria, you will be short-listed and we will explore jointly with you if there are ways in which the job can be changed to enable you to meet the requirements.