Across the globe museum-school partnerships have long been shown to be effective in enhancing students' learning and engagement across various subjects (Osterman & Shepard, 2010; Raaijmakers, Mc Ewen, Walan & Christenson, 2021). These partnerships can provide students with authentic and hands-on learning experiences that are not typically available in the classroom (Bobick & Hornby, 2013). They can also help to increase students' interest in and understanding of history, science, and the arts (Grenier, 2010; Melber & Cox-Petersen, 2005; Xanthoudaki, 1998), as well as supporting the development of 21st century skills such as critical thinking and problem-solving (Corbisiero-Drakos etal., 2021). Furthermore, museum-school partnerships can help to promote opportunities for community engagement and cultural exchange, which can lead to the understanding and appreciation of diverse perspectives and cultural agency (Matthewson-Mitchell, 2008).

However, research has shown that there are also some challenges that can arise in museum-school partnerships. These include issues such as limited resources and funding (Bobick & Hornby, 2013), lack of teacher professional learning (Grenier, 2010) and difficulty in aligning the curriculum with the museum's offerings (Ne-He, 2015). In order to be successful, it is important for museum and school staff to work closely together to plan, set goals and implement the partnership (Lang & Reeve, 2007; Ne-He, 2015), and to continually evaluate and adjust the program as needed.

This paper presents an evaluation of an innovative museum-school partnership established between the Australian Centre for the Moving Image (ACMI) and St Alban’s Heights Primary School. St Alban’s Heights is a government primary school in the western suburbs of Melbourne, it has a rich and diverse student population, of which 95% have a language background other than English.  While only 29 kilometres from the city centre and ACMI, prior to this partnership it was rare for students from St Albans Heights to come into the city, let alone access the museum. Therefore, the overarching goals of the partnership project were twofold:

• For ACMI and St Albans Heights Primary School to explore an extended partnership (3-5 years) to develop and deliver learning experiences for students, teachers and the school community with a focus on digital, screen and media literacies. ​
• Additionally, ACMI aimed to develop best practice support to schools to improve equity of access to their facilities and participation in the creation and use of screen content and digital tools and in so doing expand their museum-school partnerships.

The evaluation of the project was undertaken by a team from the School of Education at RMIT University, who acted as an impartial third party and the research questions guiding our evaluation were (1) ‘What was required to make a positive, interactive, and sustainable partnership between ACMI and St Albans Heights Primary School? (2) How might ACMI use learnings from this current partnership to inform the development of future partnerships with primary schools at scale?

A qualitative interpretive methodological approach was used in this evaluation and data was collected in situ at the school and museum. The data collection included focus group interviews with school teaching staff, the school leadership team and museum educators; follow-up one-on-one interviews with two teachers identified during the focus groups as ‘boundary brokers’; and the collection of artefacts produced by the primary school students. Braun and Clarkes (2006, 2019) reflexive thematic analysis was employed to identify patterns and themes in the focus group and interview data. While artefacts produced by students were used as a point reference to discuss the emerging development of student skill sets.

Results from this evaluation present (1) key aspects that enabled the success of the partnership; (2) points of tension that need to be managed to ensure that the partnership continues to be sustainable; (3) strategies for moving beyond student-teacher engagement to encourage wider community participation; and (4) strategies for future scaling of the partnerships between ACMI and other schools through the employment of improvement science (Bryk, Gomez, Grunow, LeMahieu, 2013). While this paper is focused on the evaluation of a partnership with Australian Centre for the Moving Image and a local primary school, the insights and strategies presented are of value to the wider discussion of museum-school partnerships.

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