What should the "next generation" of the National Health Museum’s website look like?

And whom should it serve — teachers, students, life-long learners?

How will it convey and expand upon the Museum’s physical reality?

And what are the future trends in online media that should inform its development?

These important questions form the basis for NHM Online: Version 2.0, the plan being crafted to further develop the Museum’s online presence. This plan will take the existing Museum website, including our award-winning Access Excellence initiative, and expand its reach in exciting new directions that will allow us to serve an expanded multi-generational audience of health and health science learners.

NHM Online: Version 2.0 was launched last year with a planning session hosted hosted by Museum Chairman William A. Haseltine, PhD at the Human Genome Sciences’ corporate headquarters in Rockville, MD. The session brought together an impressive mix of leaders in health, science and online media. Participants included leading online thinkers such as Thomas Kriese, Director of the AOL-Time Warner Foundation, David Jarmul, at that time, the Associate Director for Communications of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, and Neil Izenberg, MD, Director, of the Nemours Center for Children’s Health Media, which operates the highly regarded "Kids Health" website.

The goal of the session was to help develop a core concept for the Museum’s future web presence and online educational programming. Participants undertook a wide ranging discussion that touched on possible educational objectives for the Museum’s web presence, target audiences, and the development of a long-range plan for website expansion and implementation.

The ideas generated by this distinguished group, along with extensive input from the Museum Board of Trustees, have formed the preliminary basis for NHM Online: Version 2.0 and will serve as a guide for further development of the Museum’s virtual identity over the coming months.