The Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art at Cornell has been awarded a $425,000 challenge grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation for an endowment fund to strengthen the museum's education programming within the university. In keeping with the award requirements, the Johnson Museum will raise an additional $325,000 over the next three years.

"With this endowment in place, we will be able to guarantee for the future the crucial place of the museum within the curriculum of the university as a whole," said Franklin W. Robinson, the museum's Richard J. Schwartz Director.

With assistance from two previous Mellon Foundation grants, totaling nearly $400,000, the museum has made great progress in integrating its educational programming into the academic mission of the university.

Over the last four years, the museum has collaborated with a dozen faculty members to organize exhibitions on African women artists and American labor relations, among others, and has involved students in numerous museum functions, such as writing exhibition catalogs and serving as interns on curatorial projects. The museum also has become more popular as a meeting place for various classes. An average of three classes per week visit the print room to study original works, while others meet in the study gallery.

Robinson reports that these initiatives have helped to triple the number of students attending museum programming over the last four years.

"We are deeply grateful to the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation for helping us to bring about a transformation of this museum, one that has had a profound effect on this great university," Robinson said.