As a school, we are incredibly fortunate to have the world-class Museum of Fine Arts at our fingertips. With galleries which always have extensive content matter for any historical topic, it is the ideal choice for every history class. Dana Hall has taken full advantage of our fortuitous location as a school outside of Boston, and each and every member of the Social Studies Department works tirelessly to plan and execute these trips, always with great success. The Social Studies Department is the department that plans the most field trips by far, and every time a field trip is announced, everyone is excited no matter where we go. Usually, that trip happens to be an outing to the Museum of Fine Arts. However, that’s not the only educational resource that Boston has to offer.
What do the Western Civilization, African Area Studies, AP United States History, and AP Art History classes all have in common, other than their main purpose of teaching history? They all default to busing their students to the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston annually for their field trip. I have been to the Museum of Fine Arts (MFA) around three times with Dana Hall, in 9th, 10th, and now 11th grade, and most students will have gone around a similar number of times by the time they graduate.
Although I am ultimately grateful to get out of the classroom for some gallery-viewing experience and seeing real life objects that apply my knowledge of what I have learned in class, I still wish that the trips were more diversified. While the MFA field trips are different in content area every time, seeing as each trip usually focuses on different galleries, the scenery can get pretty old, especially for local day students who have seen it many times. Even boarding students who have been at Dana for more than a year or two have probably seen it already, and are familiar with what exhibits have to offer.
The Social Studies Department has definitely been making improvements in diversifying their field trips, however. This fall, I went with AP United States History to the MFA, but instead of going directly back to campus afterward, we visited the Massachusetts Historical Society (MHS) for the second half of the day. At the Massachusetts Historical Society, we got to analyze real documents from the time period we were studying and do activities with the archival materials that are not typically available or displayed in the MFA. This was a delightful experience, and my classmates and I really benefited from both viewing the artwork and interacting with historic documents. AP United States History has a lot of students, so we were split into two groups and cycled through the activities between the first and second half of the day. This is a smart option for combating the issue of large student groups making it difficult to go to other places. I think that the MHS was a spectacular addition to the trip, and the AP United States History teachers, Mr. Tipton and Ms. Paone, did an amazing job with the trip execution. Last year, I heard many exciting things about field trips that the Middle Eastern Studies class took, including a trip to a specific musical. The Area Studies courses, which are a big part of the Social Studies Department, often take students to restaurants with cuisine from the area being studied, which is an incredible and creative way for students to taste the culture they’re learning about.
Still, Dana Hall history classes could benefit from taking students to lesser-known places in the Boston area while still learning about the time period being focused on. For example, almost any history class could visit the Boston Athenaeum. United States History classes could visit the John F. Kennedy Library, one of my personal favorites, and a lesser-known site. An unexpected gem in Boston is the Institute of Contemporary Art, which usually has contemporary exhibits relating to culture or social impact which can be useful for history classes, particularly the Area Studies courses.
Let’s face it. Field trips are incredibly difficult to plan and coordinate, and the MFA is a more comfortable option for slightly simpler planning, as it is often done, and the process is familiar. The MFA has at least one gallery that pertains to the topic area of each history class, and since it is so common to take classes there, the process is more desirable. Meanwhile, classes like Photography and Middle Eastern Area Studies have successfully pulled off field trips to different places in the past. While these classes are smaller, which allows more bandwidth for diverse field trips, there are many venues for field trips all over Boston which while accommodate large groups of students. I am ultimately immensely grateful that we at Dana Hall have such a proactive history department that wants to get students involved in hands-on learning and on-site viewing, and I know our school, fortunately placed near a culturally rich city, has the potential for more exciting opportunities.
Image Source: Mary Ann McQuillan