Characterising collectors of the Pacific Entomology collection
05/08/2025
24/08/2025
$6,750.00 - $6,750.00
Internship
Auckland
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Tāmaki Paenga Hira: Tui tui hono tangata, whenua me te moana.
Auckland War Memorial Museum: Connecting through sharing stories of people, lands and seas
Auckland Museum is a much-loved culture and heritage organisation at the heart of Auckland's identity, committed to outstanding management of its world-class collections, developing and sharing engaging content through its galleries, exhibition, events, educational programmes and the permanent and volunteer staff who tell the Museum's stories. We are Auckland's home of commemoration as well as the country’s oldest research institution and a major tourist destination.
Job Description
Auckland Museum’s Summer Student Programme is open to promising undergraduate students from a range of disciplines. Students will join a cohort-style programme for ten weeks over the summer to gain career-relevant experience and have the opportunity to train alongside Museum professionals and to gain an insight into the culture and heritage sector. Our Summer Studentships provide an opportunity to undertake a project tailored to your interests and aspirations.
About the programme:
Summer studentships will run over 10 weeks from 17 November 2025 to 13 February 2026 (with a 3-week break over the Christmas and New Year period)
Cohort-style programme, with tours and talks from staff at Tāmaki Paenga Hira
A wide-range of interesting and unique research projects
A stipend of $6,750 will be awarded to each successfully selected student
Project Description:
Characterising collectors of the Pacific Entomology collection
The Auckland Museum Pacific Entomology collection contains over 6,000 specimens from the wider Pacific region (excluding Aotearoa New Zealand). These were overwhelmingly collected by individuals who were not citizens of those Pacific nations including associates of the Auckland Museum. In most cases, information about these collectors is fragmentary and separated from their collections. The student will reconnect material from documentary heritage and natural sciences collections to generate profiles for the most prolific collectors. With guidance, the student will then select and more deeply investigate one or more individuals to build a holistic portrait of the collector(s). In so building this portrait, the student will reflect on relationship between historic scientific and social conventions as evidenced within the resulting corpus of entomological specimens and data and consider how this relationship may influence the way the story of Pacific biodiversity is told today.
Desired Skills and Experience
This project will be best suited to a student with:
A general understanding of natural history collections
Skills in Excel and an ability to work with collections database
Familiarity with archival research
An interest in museology and provenance research
Closing Date: 24 August 2025
You must be currently eligible to study in New Zealand to apply for this student training opportunity.
Auckland Museum offers a rich and fulfilling environment where we embrace diversity and nurture our bicultural capability as demonstrated in our Teu le Va and He Korahi Maori strategies. We also offer a range of great benefits including an award-winning wellbeing programme.
This is a great opportunity for someone looking to be part of a fabulous New Zealand organisation committed to telling our national and Auckland stories, reflecting our unique place in the South Pacific.
He Oranga Tangata ka ao
Enriching lives. Inspiring discoveries
