Annual Report. Academic year 2020/2021

The staff members of the Steinhardt Museum of Natural History (SMNH) continued curation and pro­motion of the SMNH collections. Routine curatorial activities continued to be adversely affected to some extent by the Covid-19 pandemic during the 2020—2021 academic year. Nevertheless, much effort was dedicated to curation of the collections and to compliance with best curatorial practices. The staff continued to collect and preserve new scientific material, rescue and incorporate im­por­tant private and institutional collections, main­tain the existing holdings, send scientific ma­terial and data nationwide and abroad, and as­sist gra­duate students, academic courses and edu­cational activities.
During the 2020—2021 academic year, the Museum staff added over 19,000 new specimens of various ta­xo­no­mic groups through collecting by the Museum's curators and researchers, students and the Israel Nature and Parks Authority, or through donation from private collectors. Almost 30,000 new records were added to the Museum database.