August 2025 | Vol. 37 No.4
Children’s museum memberships are a mutually beneficial arrangement: they can provide a reliable revenue stream and help fund special programs in museums while offering families educational value, play based learning experiences, and a sense of belonging. Membership income can be crucial for sustaining the museum’s mission to educate, inspire, and engage children through interactive exhibits. It can also help provide resources for the museum to serve the community, especially in areas like underserved populations or public school collaborations.
Hand to Hand is a quarterly publication of the Association of Children’s Museums (ACM). As a member benefit, Hand to Hand is available first to ACM members, and then publicly for one year. ACM members may review the full Hand to Hand index here or access past editions of Hand to Hand via ACM’s Groupsite.
ACM has partnered with Knology to create the ACM Trends Reports series, which shares practical information for children’s museums to tell the story of our field, drawing from more than a decade of ACM member data.
The ACM Trends Reports help museum professionals use data to become more accountable to their mission and fiscal responsibilities. Concise and easily understood, the reports can be shared in internal communications with your organization’s stakeholders, including staff, Board members, and funders, or for use in marketing materials and presentations.
Access all the ACM Trends Reports via the ACM Data Hub >
The Association of Children’s Museums (ACM) and the Association of Science and Technology Centers (ASTC) are pleased to announce the release of the 2023 ACM-ASTC Workforce Survey Report. This report presents findings from 138 participating institutions, 36% of which are active ACM member museums, and 81% of which are active ASTC member museums.
