Each year the OSAC hosts a number of non-research tours; typically for children and members of the public who are interested in insects, insect collecting or natural history museums in general. We do not have any 'self-guided' exhibits, and these visits typically require the curatorial staff to pull particular specimens from the research collection. If you would like to visit the collection or know of someone who would, please read our guidelines below and then contact us.
Visits for Collectors and amateur researchers:
If you are an insect collector yourself, or the parent of children with insect collections, and are seeking information about particular insects and/or techniques related to catching or preserving insects, please contact us directly. We can generally accommodate these types of visits with very little advanced notice.
Individual non-research visits:
If you've never been to a research museum or are just curious about what we do: great! We welcome you to come visit us. Please, however, give us some advanced notice before just showing up; we do not have self-guided tours and for security and safety reasons cannot allow people to browse the research holdings unattended.
Class visits:
1. Class tours must be arranged a head of time and are only available M-F from 9am-5pm.
2. We work with public, private and homeschool classes. So that your students have a context for their visit, we ask that teachers prepare their classes before the visit with some general curriculum related to any one (1) of the following subjects:
-insects
-natural history museums
-conservation, biodiversity and/or evolution
-classifications (organizing schemes)
2. Unfortunately given space issues, the OSAC can only accomodate 15 visitors at one time (this includes parents/teachers/teachers aids).
3. Children under the ages of 16 must be accompanied by a parent or legal guardian at all times while they are in the museum
4. Children under the age of 5* must be supervised directly by an adult (e.g., 1 adult for every 2 children).
Our tours are generally for 30-40 minutes depending on the specifics of the class, their interest and knowledge level and the class size. During the tour, we use insect specimens to discuss the subjects listed above: insect natural history and diversity, why we have natural history collections and what our role is in conservation and evolutionary research. That's a lot to fit into 40 minutes! We encourage students to bring specimens with them, and to come with questions about insects in general or about natural history collections.
If you are intersted in visiting and/or checking availability for a visit, please contact the curator at: christopher.marshall@oregonstate.edu