| Chemistry for Conservators - a four month
course by correspondence Tutors: C.V. Horie (The Manchester Museum), Dr. D. Kenyon (Adult Education Lecturer) This course provides an introduction for people with little (for instance lower school chemistry studied years ago) or no chemistry. All students are assessed initially by questionnaire. The syllabus of chemistry is centred around major conservation issues: e.g. types of materials, the environment,cleaning, and deterioration. Using a combination of course literature, relevant experiments and assessed study units, the chemical principles needed to understand conservation practice are explained. The course provides an excellent background to many training courses in conservation (indeed several conservation training establishments recommend this course to potential students with inadequate chemistry background). Taking this course should enable students to gain greater insight into their everyday work. The course will be conducted in English twice a year from January to April and from September to December by post.
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| Preliminaries Chemical processes underlie many of the practices and techniques used in conservation. From environmental control to restoration, chemical interactions take place between the object and the outside world. They may be harmful or benign. This course provides an introduction for people with little or no knowledge of chemistry, for instance, school chemistry studied years ago. The syllabus is aimed at major conservation issues: e.g. types of materials, the environment, cleaning and deterioration. If you are to apply chemical principles in practical treatments, you must understand the implications of chemical action. The course is divided into four blocks. An "Introduction" to chemical explanations of the physical world uses materials of common experience, air and water. "First principles" carries this further and explains the new language of chemistry. "Chemistry in action" samples the chemistry of materials that are of use in conservation. The final block, "Chemistry and the conservator", applies the knowledge gained in the previous blocks to your work. Various types of material have been integrated to address the specific
requirements of conservation. |
| A modern, high quality, chemistry textbook has been chosen as the first
source of information. Chemistry Counts is one production of a recent realignment
in chemistry teaching towards real world problems. This is complemented
by a series of three booklets, Science for Conservators, which was developed
for the Crafts Council using a more theoretical approach.
There are fourteen units in all, two in "Introduction" and four in each of the other three blocks. A unit is designed as eight hours work spread over a week, incorporating a series of written questions. Included in the first pack are the two units of the "Introduction" which provides a gentle introduction to chemistry. We suggest that you tackle these over a few weeks so that you are primed for the later units. The questions in this first block are for self-assessment only - answers will be sent with the next block of units. Answers for subsequent units should be returned to the tutors weekly if possible, monthly if not. The assessed answers will be returned together with supplementary comments and questions, which should clear any misconceptions or gaps in knowledge. To enrol for this course, please click here to contact International Academic Projects You will be sent a questionnaire and an enrolment form |