Project LIFTOFF works with local, regional, and national partners to engineer statewide systems for Informal Science Education that inspire: YOUTH to pursue STEM education and careers through increased opportunities for quality, hands-on STEM learning. AFTERSCHOOL STAFF to facilitate STEM learning experiences that contribute to the overall STEM education and aspirations of youth in their programs. PROGRAM ADMINISTRATORS to encourage and support staff in the integration of STEM enrichment into the daily programming. STATE LEADERS to sustain and expand afterschool learning opportunities so that all students have access to engaging STEM experiences outside of the regular school day. Project LIFTOFF is dedicated to the development of the following essential elements of statewide systems for informal science education:
Access to appropriate STEM Curriculum for youth of all ages, abilities, and socio-cultural backgrounds that meets the needs and interests of individual community programs
Systematic STEM Professional Development that matches individual skills in positive youth development with abilities to facilitate discovery and science learning
A diverse Cadres of Trainers who will deliver the professional development, technical assistance and curriculum dissemination in their local communities
Authentic Evaluation of informal science efforts that determine the impacts on youth aspirations and the capacity of youth programs to provide quality STEM experiences
Local STEM education leadership to identify the ways in which collaborative education efforts can advance the development of 21st Century Skills and the preparedness for STEM workforce and higher education
Partnerships in support of youth development and informal science education that convene local, regional, and statewide organizations and stakeholders
To advance national initiatives and states' sySTEM engineering efforts, LIFTOFF coordinates an annual convening, the Midwest Afterschool Science Academy, that brings together national informal science experts, system leaders and youth development professionals to elevate the levels of science after school. The 5th MASA will be in the spring of 2014 in Kansas City, MO
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Missouri AfterSchool NetworkJeff Buehler
In this paper, we present the DeepTree exhibit, a multi-user, multi-touch interactive visualization of the Tree of Life. We developed DeepTree to facilitate collaborative learning of evolutionary concepts. We will describe an iterative process in which a team of computer scientists, learning scientists, biologists, and museum curators worked together throughout design, development, and evaluation. We present the importance of designing the interactions and the visualization hand-in-hand in order to facilitate active learning. The outcome of this process is a fractal-based tree layout that
The overarching purpose of the Climate Literacy Zoo Education Network is to develop and evaluate a new approach to climate change education that connects zoo visitors to polar animals currently endangered by climate change, leveraging the associative and affective pathways known to dominate decision-making. Utilizing a polar theme, the partnership brings together a strong multidisciplinary team that includes the Chicago Zoological Society of Brookfield, IL, leading a geographically distributed consortium of nine partners: Columbus Zoo & Aquarium, OH; Como Zoo & Conservatory, St. Paul, MN; Indianapolis Zoo, IN; Louisville Zoological Garden, KY; Oregon Zoo, Portland, OR; Pittsburgh Zoo & PPG Aquarium, PA; Roger Williams Park Zoo, Providence, RI; Toledo Zoological Gardens, OH, and the organization Polar Bears International. The partnership leadership includes the Learning Sciences Research Institute at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and the Earth System Science Center at Pennsylvania State University. The partnership is joined by experts in conservation psychology and an external advisory board. The primary stakeholders are the diverse 13 million annual visitors to the nine partner zoos. Additional stakeholders include zoo docents, interpreters and educators, as well as the partnership technical team in the fields of learning innovations, technological tools, research review and education practice. The core goals of the planning phase are to a) develop and extend the strong multidisciplinary partnership, b) conduct research needed to understand the preconceptions, attitudes, beliefs, and learning modes of zoo visitors regarding climate change; and c) identify and prototype innovative learning environments and tools. Internal and external evaluations will be conducted by Facet Innovations of Seattle, WA. Activities to achieve these goals include assessments and stakeholder workshops to inventory potential resources at zoos; surveys of zoo visitors to examine demographic, socioeconomic, and technology access parameters of zoo visitors and their existing opinions; and initial development and testing of participatory, experiential activities and technological tools to facilitate learning about the complex system principles underlying the climate system. The long-term vision centers on the development of a network of U.S. zoos, in partnership with climate change domain scientists, learning scientists, conservation psychologists, and other stakeholders, serving as a sustainable infrastructure to investigate strategies designed to foster changes in public attitudes, understandings, and behavior surrounding climate change.
In 2009, The HistoryMakers was awarded a four-year grant from The National Science Foundation (DRL-0917612) to create ScienceMakers: African Americans and Scientific Innovation (ScienceMakers). ScienceMakers builds upon The HistoryMakers’ extant oral history archives by allowing for new interviews with 180 of the nation’s top African American scientists and facilitating dissemination of the information. The overall goal of this endeavor is to increase awareness in the general public of the contributions of African American scientists (i.e., short-term outcomes), thereby ultimately leading to
Goodman Research Group, Inc. (GRG) served as the external evaluator of the three-year NSF-funded Science Festival Alliance (SFA), a collaborative started by the University of California San Diego, the MIT Museum (Cambridge, MA), the University of California San Francisco, and The Franklin Institute (Philadelphia, PA). The focus of the SFA over its first three years was helping establish and sustain science festivals in each of these four cities. The Alliance’s long-term goal is to facilitate the creation of a growing network of festivals and a community of science festival practitioners. To
The authors provide an analysis of pairs of children interacting with a multi-touch tabletop exhibit designed to help museum visitors learn about evolution and the tree of life. The exhibit’s aim is to inspire visitors with a sense of wonder at life’s diversity while providing insight into key evolutionary concepts such as common descent. The authors find that children negotiate their interaction with the exhibit in a variety of ways including reactive, articulated, and contemplated exploration. These strategies in turn influence the ways in which children make meaning through their
This research addresses the importance and benefits of informal science learning which complement formal science learning in school. Informal science learning is not fully developed and is a relatively new idea in Malaysia. Most of the researches in the field of science teaching and learning are focused on the formal learning environment in school hours. However, this research has an added value for the field of science teaching since the focus is on informal science learning environment. Informal science learning is not yet explored by any other local universities in Malaysia, thus, this research will lead to the existence of Informal Science Learning Centre in long term mission. Although the existence of the National Science Centre and Petroscience KLCC provide informal environment for science learning, nevertheless, it is argued that those two places has a weak foundation in integrating educational learning theories into the informal science activities offered in these two places. This research will provide a strong theoretical foundation of designing the informal science learning because the informal science learning in this study will be developed by using rigorous research methodology which comprise of action research method and case study design in order to translate the Multiple Intelligence Theory as informal science learning practices.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Mohd Ali SamsudinZurida IsmailAnna Christina AbdullahNooraida YakobSalmiza SalehMaznah Ali
The Museum is partnering with San Francisco State University's Department of Biology to learn more about the zombie fly, Apocephalus borealis, and how this parasitoid (like a parasite, except they always kill their host) affects honey bees, Apis mellifera. You can join this investigation by becoming a ZomBee Hunter! ZomBees are honey bees that have been parasitized by zombie flies. We know that zombie flies have been affecting honey bees in California and South Dakota. The big mysteries that need to be solved are: Where exactly are honey bees being affected? How big of a threat are zombie flies to honey bees? Have zombie flies spread to honey bees across North America? By collecting honey bees in L.A. that look like they have been affected by the zombie fly, you can be a detective for this exciting case.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Natural History Museum of Los Angeles CountyJohn Hafernick
The Museum is partnering with Butterflies and Moths of North America (BAMONA) to share data and learn more about L.A. butterflies and moths. Help us find and photograph them in Los Angeles. Why Butterflies? Unlike some of the other Citizen Science projects here at the Museum, the L.A. Butterfly Survey (LABS) isn't looking for lost butterflies. We already know the species we are likely to find in L.A., all 236 of them. What we need to find out is which butterflies and moths we're likely to find when we plant the new Pollinator Garden in the Museum's upcoming outdoor exhibit, the North Campus. When you submit images of L.A. butterflies and moths, we'll map the species closest to the Museum and determine which one's might show up when we start planting butterfly attracting plants.
With the Museum's increasing interest in urban biodiversity, we have started looking at all types of wildlife in our highly modified industrial, suburban, and urban habitats. One thing that quickly struck us was that in our own backyard, Exposition Park, nobody had documented any lizards since 1988. This seemed strange, as lizards are common in other parts of Los Angeles, and it led to the question, "Why are there no lizards here?" We hope to answer this question with the LLOLA (pronouced "lola") project. LLOLA aims to do two things: 1) Confirm the presence or absence of lizards in Exposition park. (After all, nobody has looked extensively for them! 2) Find out where lizards DO occur in the Los Angeles Basin, and start to hypothesize why they can survive there.
In spite of their importance and abundance, we do not know much about the spiders in Los Angeles. There are no truly large collections of urban spiders from this area, as most collectors concentrate on studying natural areas. As an important international port, new species of spiders from various parts of the world are always being accidentally introduced into the Los Angeles area, and some of these have established breeding populations. We need to know how widespread these introduced species have become, and how they have interacted with the native spiders. Also, we want to know how urbanization and the loss of natural habitat has affected populations and distributions of naturally occurring spiders.
MarshAccess is an informal science education program based at the Meadowlands Environment Center (MEC) in Lyndhurst, NJ, and funded by the National Science Foundation. MarshAccess seeks to engage largely underserved populations of young and older adults with disabilities, as well as older adults with age-related limitations, in outdoor experiential STEM activities centered on the New Jersey Meadowlands marsh ecosystem. Program modules are designed to increase interest in science, increase scientific literacy, develop a sustained relationship between the MEC and the target audience and audience
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Hilarie B. DavisBradford T. DaveyRamapo College of New Jersey