The Museum of Science, Boston, in partnership with Arizona State University, the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, the Loka Institute, and Scienceforcitizens.net, is conducting a 1.5-day workshop whose goal is to strengthen and expand recent cross-sector network-building activities related to engaging the public in conversations and deliberations about the assessment of the societal implications of science and technology. In attendance are about two-dozen participants representing a wide range of informal science education professionals, STEM researchers, and science policy experts. The workshop is focusing on: (1) techniques for citizen participation in technology assessment, (2) ways in which informal educational organizations are addressing the intersection of STEM with personal and societal decision-making, and (3) models for leveraging work done by others who are exploring public engagement with future technologies. The process will also help generate and coalesce ideas for the 2012 World-Wide Views on Biodiversity program, an international effort to engage the public on the topic of world-wide loss of biodiversity. The workshop outcomes will be evaluated by the Museum's Research and Evaluation Department.
The Museum of Science, Boston (MOS) and its primary collaborators, the Science Museum of Minnesota (St. Paul, MN) and the Exploratorium (San Francisco, CA), are continuing and expanding the Nanoscale Informal Science Education Network (NISE Net), which has been in operation since 2005. NISE Net has established a national infrastructure of over one-hundred hands-on science centers and universities within seven regional hubs with the goal of fostering public awareness, engagement and understanding of nanoscale science and engineering (NSE). As part of this undertaking, NISE Net partners have: - created a nation-wide set of annual events called NanoDays; - developed dozens of interactive exhibits, media-based products, programs, and public forums based on NSE; - generated new knowledge about the design for learning about NSE, its applications, and societal implications; - produced a network that involves informal educators and researchers; and - developed a Web site for professionals, www.nisenet.org, that includes several resources for educators and researchers, including a catalog of educational products. During the next five years (2010 - 2014), NISE Net will continue to develop new educational products, deepen the involvement of current partnerships in nanoscale informal science education, and expand the number of partners overall to 300 organizations. The advisory committee, content steering committee, regional hubs, and other work groups will continue to develop collaborative relationships between museums and university-based NSE research centers, including Materials Research Science and Engineering Research Centers (MRSECs) and Nanoscale Science and Engineering Centers (NSECs). A Diversity, Equity, and Access group will actively support, foster, and encourage the NISE Net\'s efforts to reach diverse audiences with regard to geography, dis/ability, gender, race/ethnicity, language, and income. Four research studies will be conducted: Partnership and Network, Institutional Change, Learning Progressions, and Evidence-Based Decision Making.
The American Museum of Natural History, the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, and the National Audubon Society are partnering to organize a workshop for scientists, educators, and community members involved in conservation-oriented Public Participation in Scientific Research (PPSR) projects. PPSR projects have the potential to advance scientific discovery by engaging volunteers in large-scale data collection and analysis, enabling volunteers to conduct scientific inquiry, and promoting stakeholder involvement in policymaking. Despite PPSR's potential, educators need to understand what mechanisms best nurture the development of skills, attitudes, and behaviors of citizen scientist volunteers. Workshop participants will share experiences, lessons learned, protocols and tools, and develop an agenda for answering still unanswered questions about advancing informal science education goals via PPSR activities. Topics for workshop sessions include models of PPSR projects; PPSR data for conservation biology; conservation psychology; integrating PPSR into conservation planning; and emerging technologies for public participation in PPSR projects. The goals of the project are to (1) enhance the practice of biodiversity science, (2) increase the potential for biodiversity conservation projects to meet educational goals, (3) allow scientists to further engage in and contribute to answering large-scale research questions, and (4) prepare the groundwork for establishing more public participation projects as part of museum public programs. The project's objectives are to identify conditions under which PPSR projects can be most useful for biodiversity conservation, explore the impact of PPSR in encouraging volunteers to become interested in and stewards of nature, identify strategies and mechanisms for expanding the reach of PPSR to new audiences, and create a network for PPSR organizers.
Portal to the Public is a program designed to assist informal science education (ISE) institutions as they seek to bring scientists and public audiences together in face-to-face public interactions that promote appreciation and understanding of current scientific research and its application. Led by Pacific Science Center (WA), in collaboration with Explora (NM), the North Museum of Natural History and Science (PA) and the Institute for Learning Innovation (MD), the program model was implemented and evaluated at five additional museums and science centers during 2007-2011. The project goals were to create a flexible and scalable guiding framework that would support ISE institutions build relationships with their local scientific community, design professional development workshops for scientists, and create public program formats featuring scientists. The project included thorough research and evaluation of the guiding framework, dissemination process, and implementation at expansion sites. The Portal to the Public project team has produced an Implementation Manual as a guide for institutions planning to implement a Portal to the Public-type program, available for download at the project website (http://www.pacificsciencecenter.org/Portal-to-the-Public/portal). It includes the Catalog of Professional Development Elements, a practical guide to creating and facilitating professional development experiences for scientists.
The Metcalf Institute for Marine & Environmental Reporting at the University of Rhode Island Graduate School of Oceanography is implementing a three-stage sequence of workshops that will bring together science journalists, communications professionals, informal science education professionals, and NSF-funded (RAPID) research scientists who are studying the Deepwater Horizon oil rig failure and its impact on the Gulf of Mexico. During this period of focused interest by the public, the three stages will allow for an iterative process of capacity-building by journalists and informal science educators that will result in a set of experiences and resources to improve the public understanding of the oil spill's impacts and the specific scientific techniques used to assess the impacts. The project's outcomes also include strengthening the communication skills of the research scientists via new media and talks tailored to journalists and informal science educators. The three stages are: (1) Three sessions at the October 2010 conference of the Society of Environmental Journalists; (2) an April 2011 2.5-day seminar in Louisiana co-hosted by Louisiana State University and Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium (including field experience on an LSU research vessel); and (3) a June 2011 week-long "science immersion workshop" (including laboratory and field experience on a URI research vessel) and five associated public lectures at the Metcalf Institute, including web cast live via Internet2. The three programs are being evaluated by faculty at the Public Policy Research Lab of LSU Manship School of Mass Communication.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Sunshine MenezesNancy RabalaisLisa LundyRobert GoidelChristopher D'Elia
This planning project by the National Academy of Sciences is the first step toward their establishment of a new initiative on helping the public become more knowledgeable about and engaged with the science of energy and energy choices. The Energy Ambassador program would eventually work around the country with several local civic/business/community leaders to provide them with a solid foundation for understanding the science of energy-related issues and provide them with a solid foundation for understanding the science of energy-related issues and developing possible strategies in their communities for public engagement and decision-making. The planning work is prelude to a pilot study and then to a major roll-out if all indicators suggest that would be successful. The planning work will convene scienctists, policy makers, educators, and media to develop the details for the pilot study, including indentifying three cities where the pilot study could take place and the science ambassadors for these. The activity will be in collaboration with the NAS's Committee on Learning Science in Informal Environments and the staff of the Board of Science Education.
This award supports a workshop to be held in conjunction with the 2010 World Maker Faire being hosted at the New York Hall of Science. The purpose of the workshop is to bring together the Maker community with formal and informal science and mathematics learning experts. The Maker movement is a recent phenomenon promoted by the Maker Media division of O'Reilly Media. There are currently three U.S. and one International Maker Faires, with attendance of about 30,000 each. The Faires consist of exhibits characterized as technology-rich and innovative and developed either by the exhibitor (Do-It-Yourself or DIY) or increasingly, as collaborative exhibits (Do-It-With-Others or DIWO). Participants visiting the Faires interact directly with the developer(s) and exhibits to learn the technology and engineering skills associated with designing and building their own products. The New York Hall of Science workshop will be co-chaired by Tom Kalil, Associate Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology, and Dale Dougherty, Founder of the Maker Faires. It will have approximately 50 participants drawn from academe, business, non-profits, and state, local and federal government. Workshop attendees will observe and participate in the Maker Faire at the New York Hall of Science the day before the workshop. On the second day, attendees will then address the following questions: 1) How can the innovations of the Maker movement inform science and mathematics education?; 2) What collaborations between policy makers, education and learning science researchers, and the Maker Movement can best spur innovation in science and mathematics education?; 3) What funding opportunities are possible between the Maker community and the private, philanthropic, and government sectors for the support of transformative science and mathematics education and learning research? The workshop will result in a multimedia report that will propose answers to these questions. The report will inform the education and learning science research communities about opportunities for innovations in education and learning. The workshop is designed to broadly inform both policy and practice in STEM Education. The Maker/DIY/DIWO movement is focused on design and engineering. These processes are important in STEM disciplines. In particular, the movement has motivated thousands of individuals to voluntarily participate in building technology-based projects in a manner similar to the open source software movement. If this motivation can be broadly harnessed, it could transform STEM education through new knowledge of STEM learning science and education research. The broader impact of this workshop is situated in the large numbers of individuals already engaged in Maker/DIY/DIWO projects. If more STEM content can be married to these projects, then the impact to science learning and teaching could be substantial. Since many of the Maker Faire participants come from rural communities, there is an implicit promise that incorporating more STEM content into Faire projects could have the effect of broadening participation to an underrepresented community.
Frozen Planet is a landmark multi-media seven-part television series, with complementary website, whose goal is to inform and inspire audiences about the environment and ecology of the Polar Regions and the science being carried out there. The series will highlight multiple disciplines including climatology, volcanology, geology, glaciology, as well as natural history. Frozen Planet will be produced in High Definition by the BBC Natural History Unit and Discovery Communications for broadcast worldwide on Discovery Channel in 2011. The proposal to NSF is for 1) field support for filming various NSF-supported research efforts in Antarctica and 2) funding to cover evaluation of the project's intended learning impacts in the United States. Goodman Research Group will conduct the summative evaluation to measure learning impacts centered on the audience's understanding of the polar environment, the science being undertaken there, and the implication of the new scientific findings to their everyday lives. For scientific and field support, the production team is collaborating with many organizations in addition to NSF's Office of Polar Programs including the British Antarctic Survey, the Canadian Polar Continental Shelf Project, and NASA. Through repeated broadcast, video-on-demand, the website, and DVDs, the project will provide a comprehensive, enduring resource. The project is anticipated to reach more than 65 million people across the U.S.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Dan ReesCarlos GutierrezChrstine Weber
Led by Washington University, Making Natural Connections: An Authentic Field Research Collaboration (DRL-0739874), is a series of two field-based informal science education programs in environmental biology targeting St. Louis area teenagers. The project aims for engagement of science research institutions and career scientists in the execution of informal science education programming, bringing real and dynamic context to the science content and allowing for deep and transparent career exploration by teenage participants. Project goals include (1) providing a model for integration of informal science education into the research and restoration projects at biological field stations and nature reserves, (2) communicating current environmental biology research to audiences outside the research community, and (3) influencing the entry of pre-college students into the science career pipeline. The project is a collaborative partnership between Washington University’s Tyson Research Center and the Missouri Botanical Garden’s Shaw Nature Reserve. The Shaw Institute for Field Training (SIFT) program trains St. Louis area high school students in scientific exploration of the natural world at Shaw Nature Reserve. During a one-week training session in June, teens are introduced to a variety of Missouri ecosystems and gain skills necessary to conduct field research, including plant and animal identifications, biotic sampling and census techniques, testing of abiotic factors, and training in the use of maps, compass and GPS. During the rest of the summer and school year, teens are involved in important research and restoration activities at Shaw, Tyson Research Center and other field research sites in the St. Louis area. Fieldwork opportunities may include invasive species management, prairie reconstruction, plant and animal inventories, and prescribed burns. The Tyson Environmental Research Fellowships (TERF) program places high school students as summer interns on ecology and environmental biology research teams at Tyson Research Center. Selected teen participants have successfully completed the SIFT program and apply their field skills to ongoing research projects at Tyson and other partnering research sites. During the summer, the four-week program provides teens with exposure to a variety of field science experiences and skills. TERF teens work alongside university scientists, post-doctoral researchers, graduate students and undergraduate students. The TERF program provides a cultural apprenticeship in university-based environmental biology research and training in scientific communication. It is an advanced summer experience modeled on the undergraduate research internships offered at Tyson. During the following school year, participants work on posters and presentations for symposia at Washington University and Tyson and at community fairs, and their posters are displayed at Shaw Nature Reserve. A national dissemination workshop for informal science educators, high school biology teachers, and research scientists provides the necessary materials and background to replicate the project design in other locales. The summative evaluation will address impacts on teenage participants (engagement, cognitive and emotional support, competence, career viability, experiential learning) and professional audiences (implementation of teen program, program components, impacts on mentoring scientists). The strategic impact of this project results from the integration of teenage immersion experiences into research activities at a university-based facility. This model of informal science training activities leading into participation in authentic research may be transferable to other STEM disciplines.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Phyllis BalcerzakPeter RavenSusan FlowersKim Medley
Michigan Technological University will collaborate with David Heil and Associates to implement the Family Engineering Program, working in conjunction with student chapters of engineering societies such as the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE), the Society of Hispanic Professionals (SHP) and a host of youth and community organizations. The Family Engineering Program is designed to increase technological literacy by introducing children ages 5-12 and their parents/caregivers to the field of engineering using the principles of design. The project will reach socio-economically diverse audiences in the upper peninsula of Michigan including Native American, Hispanic, Asian, and African American families. The secondary audience includes university STEM majors, informal science educators, and STEM professionals that are trained to deliver the program to families. A well-researched five step engineering design process utilized in the school-based Engineering is Elementary curriculum will be incorporated into mini design challenges and activities based in a variety of fields such as agricultural, chemical, environmental, and biomedical engineering. Deliverables include the Family Engineering event model, Family Engineering Activity Guide, Family Engineering Nights, project website, and facilitator training workshops. The activity guide will be pilot tested, field tested, and disseminated for use in urban, suburban, and rural settings. Strategic impact will result from the development of content-rich engineering activities for families and the dissemination of a project model that incorporates the expertise of engineering and educational professionals at multiple levels of implementation. It is anticipated that 300 facilitators and 7,000-10,000 parents and children will be directly impacted by this effort, while facilitator training may result in more than 27,000 program participants.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Neil HutzlerEric IversenChristine CunninghamJoan ChaddeDavid Heil
resourceprojectProfessional Development, Conferences, and Networks
This conference proposal, organized by the National Center for Science and Civic Engagement, is convening professionals both in higher education and in informal science education, all of whom have done work or are seriously interested in the interface of science, society and civic engagement. The purpose of the conference is to build bridges between and explore new connections among these communities around their mutual interests in emerging educational practices that promote self-directed learning in STEM through connections with matters of civic consequence.
The Science Motivation Questionnaire II is a reliable and validated survey that assesses science motivation based on 5-factors (intrinsic motivation, self-efficacy, career motivation, self-determination, grade motivation).