MSU Museum celebrates 25 years as Michigan’s first Smithsonian Affiliate

The MSU Museum is celebrating 25 years as Michigan’s first Smithsonian Affiliate, marking a milestone in a partnership that has connected Michigan State University students, faculty and communities with one of the world’s leading cultural institutions while contributing the university’s own research, collections and expertise to a national network.

Since becoming a Smithsonian Affiliate in September 2001, the MSU Museum has collaborated with the Smithsonian Institution to bring nationally recognized exhibitions, educational programs, research partnerships and public engagement opportunities to Michigan. The relationship also enables the museum to share its own scholarship, collections and innovative approaches with Smithsonian museums and affiliates across the country.

“The Smithsonian partnership reflects the very best of what a university museum can be,” said Devon Akmon, director of the MSU Museum. “For 25 years, it has allowed us to connect our campus and community with extraordinary national resources while contributing Michigan State University’s research, creativity and public scholarship to conversations that reach far beyond our state. We are proud to celebrate this milestone and excited about what we will build together in the future.”

As a Smithsonian Affiliate, the MSU Museum has presented traveling exhibitions, collaborated on educational initiatives, welcomed Smithsonian leaders and curators, and participated in national programs that advance community engagement, cultural sustainability and museum innovation.

In recent years, the museum has premiered Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service, or SITES, exhibitions including "Sounds of Religion" and "Knowing Nature: Stories of the Boreal Forest." "Knowing Nature" launched its national tour at the MSU Museum alongside "A Boreal Balance," an interactive game created by MSU students that now travels with the exhibition, extending its exploration of climate change, Indigenous knowledge and environmental interdependence to audiences across the country.

The partnership has also created opportunities for collaboration beyond exhibitions. The museum has hosted Smithsonian Leadership for Change interns, participated in national cohorts focused on community dialogue and cultural sustainability, including the African American Craft Initiative, and welcomed distinguished Smithsonian leaders such as Jorge Zamanillo, founding director of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Latino, and Margaret Weitekamp, of the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum. MSU Museum staff have also contributed expertise to national Smithsonian exhibition projects.

Two recent initiatives illustrate the breadth of the partnership.

In October 2025, the MSU Museum hosted its third Smithsonian National Youth Summit, bringing together students from Everett, East Lansing and Waverly high schools alongside institutions nationwide. The program invited participants to explore the history of youth-led activism while examining how young people can create greater educational opportunity within their own communities. MSU teacher education students helped develop and facilitate the experience, creating meaningful opportunities for both future educators and local high school students.

Following the museum’s reopening in January 2026, visitors experienced "X-Ray Vision: Fish Inside Out," an exhibition organized by the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History and SITES. Featuring 40 large-scale digital X-ray images from the Smithsonian’s National Collection of Fishes, the exhibition transformed scientific imaging into striking works of art while providing students, researchers and visitors with a unique perspective on hundreds of millions of years of fish evolution.

While the MSU Museum’s formal Smithsonian affiliation began in 2001, connections between the two institutions reach back to the museum’s earliest years. In 1862, Manly Miles, an early museum curator and professor at what was then the Agricultural College of the State of Michigan, corresponded with the Smithsonian about publications and natural history specimens. That same year, the State Board of Agriculture directed Miles to establish correspondence with the Smithsonian and other institutions to help build the college’s natural history collections. Letters preserved by the Smithsonian Institution Archives, along with a ledger documenting gifts to the Agricultural College, provide a glimpse into this early relationship between the two institutions.

Today, the MSU Museum continues to strengthen its role as a creative collaboratory where research, education and public engagement intersect. Its 25-year Smithsonian affiliation expands opportunities for learning and discovery while demonstrating how a public research university can both benefit from and contribute to a national cultural network.

As the MSU Museum celebrates this milestone, it looks forward to continuing its collaboration with the Smithsonian to inspire curiosity, foster dialogue and advance knowledge for audiences in Michigan and across the nation.

This story first appeared on the MSU Museum website.