Recognition

The societal responsibility of the Maison de la Science is, among other things, to offer the codes of science to as many people as possible and to remind us of the omnipresence of science in our daily lives. Since 2018, the Maison de la Science has been recognized by the federation Wallonia-Brussels as a category B museum. In addition to the financial support it provides, this recognition is an opportunity for us to constantly step back and question our practices.

For the five-year period 2022-2027, the main objectives we have set for ourselves are: to highlight the museum and university identities of the Maison de la Science, to develop research within the museum, and to strengthen and professionalize the museum organization chart. These three objectives serve as a guide for the development of each museum axis and induce the general coherence of the scientific and cultural project of the Maison de la Science of Liege.

The Maison de la Science is a university museum and intends to play a role as a window to the university through its actions. Like its Alma Mater, the Maison de la Science articulates its missions around three axes: research, education and citizenship.

First, research. Science is evolving and, in order to present it, a museum cannot be satisfied with exhibiting the past and cannot deny that tomorrow's heritage is being created today. Through the creation of innovative mediation devices and research on exhibition, we bring contemporary research to the public. Seeking the university museum of tomorrow means helping the University to meet the general public and helping the general public to understand the University.

Secondly, education. The collections of the Maison de la Science are largely derive from education. The educational work carried out since its creation is the source of a great deal of field experience. The time has come to share this experience, through publication, and to formalize what has been learned, through introspective research work. Proposing the museum as a place for training and hosting master's degree work, internships and theses, means integrating the Maison de la Science into academic life.

Finally, citizenship. Within intra-university collaborations, the museum is working to make the scientific process and knowledge more understandable. The diversity of subjects and the complementary approaches of these partnerships will help us to reach a greater diversity of audiences. By continuing to diversify our external partnerships, outside the framework of mediation (theaters, visual artists, musicians...), we create a new gateway to the museum. Finding new ways to arouse emotion, to convert it into interest, is for us a way to help the public discover the path of research. This repositioning of science in the cultural sphere requires reaching out to the "non-visitors" and giving them the necessary tools to understand the museum. In addition to the above-mentioned aspects, the Maison de la Science is involved in training, in welcoming people with disabilities or from modest backgrounds. These projects should be a source of evolution in the museum approach.

Taking the opposite view of many museums, the Maison de la Science has always integrated the idea of an interactive visiting experience in which the visitor is the actor of his discoveries, his experience and his learning. This museum approach is constantly enriched by the close encounters with school groups and the activities automatically offered to each visitor. The information resulting from these privileged contacts feeds the development of new devices and acts as a formative evaluation of the visitors, as desired by the OCIM (National center of ideation, of shared knowledge, of reference for the actors of museums).