Research project seeks to strengthen the bio-cultural heritage present in the Museum of Natural History of the University of Cauca

With the completion of arduous field work during Holy Week 2023, in which 2,125 people visited, two research groups are articulated in a project that seeks to design a management plan for the Natural History Museum as a mechanism for strengthening the bio-cultural heritage of the University of Cauca.

The Natural History Museum (MHN) of the Universidad del Cauca is considered a space for learning and interaction with scientific knowledge; It shows in its exhibition collections 601 specimens of geological diversity, 1,140 specimens of wildlife preserved in the taxidermy technique and 360 archaeological objects, in addition to approximately 90,632 specimens in reference collections, which are the object of study, knowledge and admiration for researchers, students, tourists and citizens in general.

The "Management Plan for the Natural History Museum of the University of Cauca" is an important project that, in one of its components, seeks to characterize the visitors of the Museum in order to determine their profile based on socio-cultural variables, while At the same time, it seeks to know the perception that the visitor has during the tour of the different exhibition halls; These elements are key to improving the service provided and to designing strategies that allow access to a greater number of visitors.

This internally developed research project is being led by Professor Luis Germán Gómez Bernal, Director of the Museum and researcher of the Geology, Ecology and Conservation Studies Group (GECO) of the Faculty of Natural, Exact and Educational Sciences, with the participation of the professors of the Tourism program, Amanda Lucía Fernández and Ángela Chantre Astaíza from the Sys-Témico Research Group, belonging to the Faculty of Accounting, Economic and Administrative Sciences of the University of Cauca.

During the Holy Week season, from Palm Sunday to Easter Sunday, the Museum was visited by 1,693 adults and 432 children who, on a tour of the 7 exhibition halls, got to know a representative sample of the country's bio-cultural diversity. In this same space, at the end of the visit, the students Lisbeth Alexandra Muñoz and Darcy Amalfy Pérez, students of the Tourism Program, applied surveys to adults, obtaining 1,010 surveys completed by visitors among residents and national and foreign tourists, data that will serve as input both for the diagnosis of the museum and for the strategies that will be included in the management plan.

To attend to the large influx of public during that tourist season in Popayán, the Museum's management team had the support of students from different programs of the institution attached to the volunteer program of the Cultural Management Division of the Vice-rectory of Culture and Well-being, students from different schools within the framework of social work and the National Police.

Thus, from our Alma Mater, different research projects are being carried out that seek to impact and transform the local reality, because we know that with the Management Plan that is developed from the project, the experience of all visitors to the Museum can be strengthened. of Natural History, impacting tourism in the city and the immediate environment, which on this occasion would be the inhabitants of the La Pamba neighborhood, with whom they have been working together to make this area a safe place of knowledge, action framed in our commitment to be a University of Excellence and Solidarity.