Unicorn Projects, Inc. is producing and distributing a project on the origins of life and its connections to the origin of the universe. The project will present the challenges facing scientists working to unlock universal mysteries and the often painstaking but ultimately rewarding process of the scientific endeavor. It will be designed to reach the lay audience by linking what seem to be abstract and complicated ideas -- like how the universe was born, or how stars evolve -- to issues at the heart of everyday life raised by such simple questions as "Where did we come from?" The components of the project will include: * Four, one-hour television programs for prime time broadcast * An informal science outreach component targeted to middle school-age children and families * Activity kits and training guides adaptable for both informal and formal education * A World Wide WEB site The Co-Executive Producers for the series will be Thomas Levenson and Larry Klein. Levenson has been on the staff of NOVA at WGBH and was producer for the NOVA program on Einstein. Klein has been the producer for numerous science films including "Matters of Life and Death" in the Science Odyssey series. The co-producer for the series and science editor for the project will be Alan Dressler, an astronomer and cosmologist whose principal area of research is the formation and evolution of galaxies. Advisors to the series include: Colleen Cavanaugh, Professor of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology at Harvard University; George V. Coyne, Director of the Vatican Observatory; Douglas Erwin, Research Paleobiologist and Curator at the National Museum of Natural History; Sandra Faber, Professor of Astronomy and University Professor at the UCO/Lick Observatory, UC, Santa Cruz; John P. Grotzinger, Professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Matt Mountain, Director of the Gemini 8M Telescopes project; and Ethan J. Schreier, Astronomer and Associate Director for Operations at the Space Telescope Science Institute. Outreach material will be developed by staff at the Pacific Science Center and implementation will be handled by the AAAS.
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Thomas LevensonLarry KleinBarbara Flagg
The Astronomical Society of the Pacific requests $1,348,428 to enhance the dissemination of Project ASTRO in communities by building new capability into an existing network to serve the "whole family". Family ASTRO will consist of the following components: Six Family Astronomy Kits, in English and Spanish, each consisting of a suite of hands-on activities that can be done with simple materials that are available to a wide range of families. All families will have the capability to perform these activities. A Family Astronomy Events Manual to help partners and site leaders use star parties, Sun, Moon, and Shadows sessions, and other larger group astronomy events into the project. Training protocols and materials at three levels: to train the families in doing astronomy activities directly, to train the astronomy/teachers partners to work with families and to train regional site leaders on the best ways to work with their local partners to start their own Family ASTRO program. The project will have a strong focus on families of underserved populations in science by continuing the work of Project ASTRO sites in urban areas such as Chicago and San Francisco, and in rural areas like southern New Mexico.
Communicating Ocean Sciences to Informal Audiences (COSIA) is an innovative project that creates unique partnerships between informal science education institutions and local colleges conducting research in ocean sciences, with an emphasis on earth, biological and geochemical sciences. The project enables over 100 undergraduate and graduate students that are enrolled in the Communicating Ocean Sciences college course to create engaging learning activities and teaching kits in conjunction with their informal education partners. Institutional teams include: Long Beach Aquarium and California State University-Long Beach; Hatfield Marine Science Center and Oregon Sea Grant at Oregon State University; Virginia Aquarium and Science Center and Hampton University; Liberty Science Center and Rutgers University; and Lawrence Hall of Science and University of California-Berkeley. Students learn valuable outreach skills by providing visiting families and children with classes, guided tours and interactive learning experiences. Deliverables include a three-day partner workshop, a series of COSIA Handbooks (Collaboration Guide, Informal Education Guide and Outreach Guide), an Informal Science Education Activities Manual and Web Bank of hands-on activities. Strategic impact will be realized through the creation of partnerships between universities and informal science education institutions and capacity building that will occur as informal science institutions create networks to support the project. It is also anticipated the evaluation outcomes will inform the field abut the benefits of museum and university partnerships. The project will impact more than 30,000 elementary and middle school children and their families, as well as faculty, staff and students at the partnering institutions.
University of California, Berkeley's Lawrence Hall of Science (LHS), in partnership with the Children's Hospital and Research Center Oakland (CHRCO), proposes to design, develop, implement, and evaluate a hospital-based educational program using pedagogically rich mobile learning experiences with age-appropriate K-12 health sciences content. LHS staff will combine educational technology, curriculum, and learning research expertise to create a new, inquiry based health science program delivered through tablet computers or PlayPads. The interactive media, digital stories, and gaming on PlayPads will feature everyday concepts and important foundations in health education based on the science content and learning frameworks from successful science curricula created at LHS. Hospital patients and their families, visitors, staff, and volunteers will encounter PlayPads with finished waiting room exhibit media stations designed and constructed by Exploratorium Exhibit Services, on teaching carts deployed by hospital educators, and through individual check-out units. PlayPads content will also be available outside of the hospital setting through the Internet for extended use on personal mobile devices and computers. The mission of the PlayPads program is to increase exposure of the hospital-going public to topics directly relevant to healthy lives and families through mobile technology. PlayPads will be an inviting experience for youth, framing interactions with driving questions and common misconceptions to inspire the curiosity of participants. Youth ages 8 to 16 will experience wide-ranging interactives including: games that show the hazards of smoking, simulations of blood flow through the heart, brain quizzes to hone memory function, or lively info-graphics about the nutritional shortcomings of junk food. Given the recent strides in the affordability of touch screen technology and the rapid adoption of mobile computing ecosystems, this is an unprecedented time to build a ubiquitous health educational program within a contextually relevant environment like a hospital. PlayPads will be a model for delivering health education content in a unique educational setting leveraging the great strides in consumer mobile technology. By working with a strong, local hospital partner that serves a highly diverse ethnic and socioeconomic population, LHS staff will ensure the portability of the program for future healthcare providers. With the extensive private and public networks of both LHS and CHRCO, PlayPads will potentially have a lasting impact on health education efforts in the San Francisco Bay Area and beyond.
The Self-Reliance Foundation (SRF) Conociendo Tu Cuerpo (Know Your Body) Hispanic Community Health Sciences Education project is an initiative designed to introduce Hispanic students and families to biomedical science and health education resources, and increase their participation levels in these fields. The educational goals of the project are to: (1) Encourage Hispanic undergraduate students to pursue careers in biomedicine and science through a mentoring program at the university level; (2) Inspire an interest in biomedical science among Hispanic elementary-age students and parents through community outreach activities; (3) Inform Hispanic parents about biomedical science education standards and academic requirements for pursuing biomedical and science related careers; and (4) Inform and inspire Hispanic students and their families about the biomedical sciences and related careers through a series of daily nationally broadcast Spanish-language radio capsules, and a nationally syndicated Spanish newspaper column. Conociendo Tu Cuerpo (Know Your Body) includes several key components: A model, Washington, D.C., area coalition of informal science, health, community, education, and media organizations that will publicize and provide hands-on health science activities at community festivals and other community settings; Hispanic undergraduate student health-science fellows to be trained and provided experience in facilitating health science activities; and nationally broadcast Spanish-language radio capsules that will cover topics in areas of biomedicine, research, education, and health-science careers. Parents and students will be able to access additional information about biomedical science opportunities and Hispanic role models in the biomedical sciences through the project's Conociendo Tu Cuerpo website and the bilingual 800 telephone help line promoted by 147 participating radio stations and 102 newspapers nationwide. The project will be supported at the national level through collaboration with the Hispanic Radio Network and the Pacific Science Center. The Washington, D.C., collaborative will include the Capital Children's Museum, local Spanish language radio stations, area universities, and health and community organizations. Development Associates, the largest American education and evaluation consulting corporation, will evaluate the project.
Understanding a community's concerns and informational needs is crucial to conducting and improving environmental health research and literacy initiatives. We hypothesized that analysis of community inquiries over time at a legacy mining site would be an effective method for assessing environmental health literacy efforts and determining whether community concerns were thoroughly addressed. Through a qualitative analysis, we determined community concerns at the time of being listed as a Superfund site. We analyzed how community concerns changed from this starting point over the subsequent
A research project that is only expert-driven may ignore the role of local knowledge in research, often gives low priority to the development of a comprehensive communication strategy to engage the community, and may not deliver the results of the study to the community in an effective way. Objective: To demonstrate how a research program can respond to a community research need, establish a community-academic partnership, and build a co-created citizen science program. Methods: A place-based, community-driven project was designed where academics and community members maintained a reciprocal
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Univeristy of Wisconsin- StoutMonica Ramirez-AndreottaMark BrusseauJanick ArtiolaRaina MaierA Jay Gandolfi
On June 20-22, 2008, the Philadelphia/Camden Informal Science Education Collaborative (PISEC) conducted the Bridges Conference for museum/community partnership programs that serve families. The conference was funded by a National Science Foundation (NSF) grant (DRL# 0734835), which covered planning, implementation, evaluation and dissemination. The Bridges Conference was designed to bring together professionals involved with long-term museum/community relationships, and to offer opportunities to share and develop new strategies to (1) address practical issues inherent in funding, developing
The following are interviews with people whose long-term involvement with the PISEC program has been life-changing. Most started as participants, with or without friends and family, and over time became PISEC leaders. Most of those profiled here are parents. Because PISEC programs are geared to families, these parents brought their children to events starting at a very young age. As their children grew up in PISEC, they too, became involved with the program. In some cases, children took on leadership roles of their own; in other cases, children’s interest in science activities and studies grew
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Philadelphia-Camden Informal Science Education Collaborative (PISEC)Minda BorunBarbara Martin KellyLisa Jo Rudy
PISEC is a four-museum partnership focused on education - the Academy of Natural Sciences, the Franklin Institute Science Museum, the New Jersey State Aquarium, and the Philadelphia Zoo. One of PISEC's Initiatives, Community Connections, forged a long-term relationship between museums and urban community organizations to help families learn more about the science education resources available to them in and around their neighborhoods. This document explores the Community Connections initiative, presenting insights and next steps related to the program.
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Philadelphia-Camden Informal Science Education Collaborative (PISEC)Kathleen WagnerMinda BorunJean FerraroJulie Johnson
This project engages members of racially and economically diverse communities in identifying and carrying out environmental projects that are meaningful to their lives, and adapts technology known as NatureNet to assist them. NatureNet, which encompasses a cell phone app, a multi-user, touch-based tabletop display and a web-based community, was developed with prior NSF support. Core participants involved in programs of the Anacostia Watershed Society in Washington, D.C., and Maryland, and the Reedy Creek Nature Preserve in Charlotte, NC, will work with naturalists, educators, and technology specialists to ask scientific questions and form hypotheses related to urban waterway restoration and preservation of native species. They will then collect and analyze data using NatureNet, requesting changes to the technology to customize it as needed for their projects. Casual visitors to the nature centers will be able to interact with the environmental projects via the tabletop, and those who live farther away will be able to participate more peripherally via the online community. The research project, led by researchers from the University of Maryland, College Park, with collaborators from the University of North Carolina, Charlotte, and the University of Colorado, Boulder, will provide answers to two questions: 1) How do community-driven informal environmental learning projects impact participants, including their motivation to actively participate in science issues via technology and their disposition toward nature preserves and scientific inquiry? and 2) What are the key factors (e.g., demographic composition of participants, geographical location) that influence the development of community-driven environmental projects? Researchers will gather extensive qualitative and quantitative data to understand how community projects are selected and carried out, how participants approach technology use and adaptation, and how informal learning and engagement on STEM-related issues can be fostered over a period of several months and through iterative project cycles. Data will be collected through motivation questionnaires; focus groups; interviews; tabletop, mobile, and website interaction logs; field notes from participatory design and reflection sessions; and project journals kept by nature preserve staff. Through extensive research, iterative design, and evaluation efforts, researchers will develop an innovative model for community-driven environmental projects that will deepen informal science education by demonstrating how members of diverse communities connect environmental knowledge and scientific inquiry skills to the practices, values, and goals of their communities, and how technology can be used to facilitate such connections.
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Tom YehMary Lou MaherJennifer PreeceTamara CleggCarol Boston
There is growing evidence that children develop science-related interests in early childhood, before they enter school, and that these interests may have long-term implications for science participation and achievement. Although researchers have made headway in describing interest development in the preschool years, little is currently known about the proximal processes influencing early childhood interests and how these relate to other more distal factors, such as parent beliefs and attitudes. To address this gap, I conducted a two-phase, mixed-method study, involving an initial cross