At Lunch with Alberto Meloni

A Conversation with Alberto Meloni, President of Exploration Place

Alberto Meloni was so eager to become Exploration Place’s new president that he began working a month before his official start date in July, acquainting himself with the organization and people who work there. He also managed to rein in a mammoth-sized exhibit—a forty-two-foot-long replica of Sue, the largest, most-complete and best-preserved T. rex fossil yet discovered. By all indications, Meloni has great expectations.

Sue, on loan from Chicago’s Field Museum, came to Wichita because Meloni insisted that Exploration Place’s name be placed on a waiting list. It’s the first of many major exhibits he intends to secure to make Exploration Place a top-notch, internationally recognized facility. “People should expect this to be a world-class science center,” he says. “We certainly have the space and the staff to make it possible.”

Typically, major exhibits are reserved two or three years ahead of time, and he’s quick to point out that he won’t count on serendipity again. Meloni’s first order of business is working with Exploration Place board members to develop a five-year strategic plan. It won’t be one they live and die with, he says. They may tweak and revisit it along the way to make sure it’s still serving the center’s needs.

As we have lunch together at the eastside Ted’s Montana Grill over a plate of fresh cedar plank salmon and a glass of house wine, Meloni shares his vision for the center. “Is it a children’s museum, or a science museum?” he wonders aloud. “I think it has the potential and wherewithal to be both. There’s room enough for all ages to find what they’re looking for.” Along with bringing in exhibits that people would otherwise have to travel hours away to see, Meloni also foresees Exploration Place producing major exhibits and Cyberdome Theatre shows—first for locals to enjoy, then to take out on the road.

“Right now, everything is on the table, and nothing is sacred,” he says. “We need to give you ten reasons each year or more to come to Exploration Place, through changing exhibits, wonderful events and presentations and lectures. And then it would make sense for you to have a membership.”

He fervently believes that Exploration Place has an obligation to respond to its constituency and be the best it can be, especially because it receives county funding for a portion of its operating expenses. Moving forward, education will be at the heart of everything they do. “Education is the central core, and everything else radiates or feeds into it,” he says. Beyond being a destination for school field trips, the center wants to reach out to students within their own learning environments, teaching and presenting a science curriculum based on what schools need and want, while giving them access to resources beyond their budgets.

When the center opened in 2000, it had what Meloni perceives as “all the right ideas, all the perfect planning. Everything was so right,” he says. “After opening to a lot of fanfare and grand numbers, it went through a normal cycle, but perhaps was allowed to linger there too long. We’ll have to work hard to recapture the level of commitment and enthusiasm that was there before, but it can and will be done.”

Meloni’s professional accomplishments and global perspective gained from living and traveling overseas (he was born in Lucca, Italy) are convincing that this will happen. His last assignment in St. Joseph, Missouri, included a daring move to bring together several fledgling museums under one entity. While he doesn’t see that happening here—although the list of St. Joseph heritage museums closely parallels some in Wichita—he can envision and see the need for a local alliance.

“Bringing the museums together in a forum to share information would be a good thing,” says Meloni. “It saddens me there is no museum association in Wichita. It doesn’t have to be a fancy bureaucratic association, but more of a united group that can speak for itself. Each [of the museums] deserves to be what it can be, because this town would be the loser without any one of them.”

He suggests that such an alliance, and just one museum’s ability to draw unprecedented crowds, could help all the local museums thrive. “If one attracts millions, they all will benefit…because if I come to a city to see a museum or two, I’ll end up discovering the others.”

Much of the groundwork, he says, is in place for Exploration Place to reach such lofty heights. “A science center’s surrounds have to put you in the mood to wonder, and Exploration Place’s physical presence, inside and out, is spectacular. One immediately has a sense of awe and wonder. The center also has a great staff that needs to be supported and nurtured to achieve its own greatness.”

If ever there was a time when the planets seemed to be aligned for Meloni’s grand vision to become reality, it may be now. “The board and the county are totally committed,” he says, “and outside of a cataclysmic event, all of us working together can’t miss.”