Introduction FossiLab is a public exhibition preparation facility in the National Museum of Natural History, designed to demonstrate the process of fossil preparation to museum visitors (Figure 1). It was created because Smithsonian Institution administration and Department of Paleobiology (Paleobiology) staff desired to increase worker presence in the lab, yet permanent staff duties were already obligated in other parts of the institution. A grant from the Smithsonian Women's Committee thus enabled the creation of a volunteer training programme to great- ly increase numbers of productive and visible work- ers (Jabo et al. this volume). Students were recruited from multiple venues, screened based on self-evaluations and in-lab inter- views, and a total of 29 were accepted and trained during the fall of 2008 (Jabo et al. this volume). Training sessions were divided into two sections, a five-day course in moulding and casting, and a six- day course in preparation methods. Michael Holland and Pete Reser were contracted to lead the moulding and casting section, and M. Brown and M. Smith led the preparation course. Instructors developed a cur- riculum based on input from Paleobiology staff members. The department indicated specific tasks they would like students to accomplish within FossiLab and the students were given basic instruc- tion in a wide array of methods to achieve those goals. Both courses created methods for evaluation and critique of student abilities; the process for cre- ating the preparation course is the topic of this paper. Background There are currently no widely accepted training pro- grammes for fossil preparation in North America (Brown and Kane 2008; Brown 2009), though some institutions have semi-formal or formal programmes of instruction (Johnson 2001; Anné 2006; Carpenter 179 THE SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION'S EXHIBIT FOSSIL PREPARATION LAB VOLUNTEER TRAINING PROGRAMME, PART II: TRAINING AND EVALUATING STUDENT PREPARATORS by Matthew Brown, Matthew Smith, Steve Jabo and Abby Telfer Brown, M., Smith, M., Jabo, S. and Telfer, A. 2010. The Smithsonian Institution's exhibit fossil preparation lab Volunteer Training Programme, part II: Training and evaluating student preparators. The Geological Curator 9 (3): 179 - 186. In November and December of 2008, the National Museum of Natural History hosted a training course for instruction of paleontological preparation methods in order to build a large pool of volunteers for the FossiLab public exhibition. Through a grant from the Smithsonian Women's Committee, the Department of Paleobiology funded four weeks of intensive, hands-on training for a group of 29 volunteers in moulding, casting and fossil preparation methods. Contracted instruc- tors worked with institutional staff to create a curriculum for training specific tasks, as well as to create general knowledge of preparation methods. Classes consisted of lecture, demonstration, and hands-on components. Instructors monitored the stu- dents throughout the instruction period, and concluded the programme with written and practical examinations. The instructors provided written evaluations for each student and presented recommendations for placement with specific tasks within the department. After the conclusion of the programme students retained much of their instruction and have gone on to successfully keep the preparation laboratory staffed while preparing fossils for the visiting public. Matthew Brown, Vertebrate Paleontology Laboratory, University of Texas at Austin, 10100 Burnet Road, Austin, TX 78758 Email: matthewbrown@mail.utexas.edu; Matthew Smith, Petrified Forest National Park, Petrified Forest, Arizona, 86028; Steve Jabo, Department of Paleobiology, Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, Washington D.C.; Abby Telfer, Department of Paleobiology, Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, Washington D.C. Received 4th February 2010.