Welcome to the Tennessee Association of Museums

Congratulations to our TAM Award Winners!

The TAM Awards Committee would like to congratulate all of the museums who were recognized at the TAM Awards of Excellence ceremony in Clarksville. 28 museums were presented with 89 Awards of Excellence and Awards of Commendation for their outstanding work. A complete list of the winners can be found HERE, and photos from the ceremony can be seen and downloaded from TAM’s Facebook page HERE .

During the judging process, the committee identified nominations they felt were outstanding for various reasons, including creativity, impact and reach, mission related, and resources used to be considered for the Past President’s Award. The top choices were presented to the past Presidents of TAM (Dan Pomeroy, Bill Hickerson, Myers Brown and Adam Alfrey), who then chose one to be recognized as the outstanding nomination for the year. This year, the Abraham Lincoln Library and Museum in Harrogate TN was chosen for the Past President’s Award for their Special Event, “Civil War S.T.E.A.M.”

In collaboration with staff and departments from Lincoln Memorial College, where the museum is located, they combined history with science for a one-day learning event during the state-wide STEAM Festival, and reached nearly 300 elementary students from rural schools in a tri-state area. With volunteers providing information and hands-on activities, students visited different stations that discussed medicine, how water spread disease, archaeology, animals used in war, period games, and even math.

The past presidents noted, "This was an extremely innovative effort to reach across disciplines, recruit a large number of experts outside the museum, and engage the local community (especially, of course, young people)."

Natalie Sweet, Program Coordinator at ALLM, had this to say about being recognized: "Like many other museums, we dream big in our programming, but we had no idea that we might win the Past Presidents Award. As much as anything, we submitted Civil War S.T.E.A.M. for consideration so that we might receive feedback from our museum community. To say that we received verification that we are on the right track is an understatement! There are so many wonderful museums in Tennessee that do excellent educational programming. I know this first-hand, as I'm a mom to an eight and three year old, and our family takes advantage of as many programming opportunities across the state that we can. To know that others view our work as in the same league as the programs we have enjoyed so much is a great feeling.”