The New Mexico Museum of Natural History in Albuquerque will design and construct a 6,250 square foot permanent exhibit on the geology and biology of the intracontinental Cretaceous Period seacoast environment of New Mexico. Using more than 20 interactive exhibits as well as modern and extinct plant and animal species, visitors will experience and explore this ancient, yet familiar world and develop a sense of the relationships between past and present, living and dead, extinction and survival as well as the continuity of natural processes. The Museum will also construct related traveling exhibits for statewide display and install semi-permanent satellite exhibits in four communities that have relevant geologic and paleontologic resources. Exhibition designs will be based on formal and informal studies of exhibit effectiveness, systematic study of learning styles of visitors to the New Mexico Museum of Natural History, and interaction with schools throughout New Mexico. This new natural history museum has an impressive staff, a record of institutional development and of state-wide community service, and a clear plan for carrying out informal science education with regional themes that serve the varied populations of New Mexico. The museum presently receives about 375,000 visits a year, of which 70,000 are in organized school groups with 45% Hispanic and/or Native American children. There is a substantial outreach program and extensive relationships with teachers and schools throughout the region. This $1.6-million exhibit project is supported by $840,000 of state funds and $500,000 in private contributions. A National Science Foundation award of $298,886 for FY87 is recommended.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Michael JuddCaren WaltJeffrey GottfriedDavid Gillette
The Cincinnati Museum of Natural History is moving from a long established site to a new 175,000 square foot facility in a rehabilitated downtown railway station. The opening permanent exhibition, "Cincinnati: The Pleistocene Legacy," will comprise 20,000 square feet of natural history exhibits that present in depth the geologic, climatic, and biological phenomena of the Ice Age in Ohio. In addition to large scale, dramatic "walk-through exhibits" and dioramas and substantial use of collections, a large number of interactive exhibit components will illustrate different features of the Pleistocene period. NSF support be concentrated on these interactive components and on work to insure effective handicapped access for the entire exhibit. This highly regarded project will cost $2.8 million, matching NSF funds seven times over. It will generate an annual audience of 875,000 visitors including more than 120,000 school group visitations.
The Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago, with partial support from NSF, will develop science, mathematics, and technology components for a new, permanent 17,000 square foot exhibition on the Pacific. Broad in scope and dramatic in its impact, this exhibition will cut across many fields and disciplines in presenting a coherent, integrated view of the Pacific regions. Topics from anthropology, geology, biology and geography will be combined using collections, reconstructed objects, large scale models, and interactive components in this landmark exhibition. The project will make extensive use of leading researchers, educators, and an evaluation consultant, and will utilize a variety of prototyping and formative exhibit development techniques. The science, mathematics and technology portion will cost $ 1.9 million, of which approximately one third is requested from NSF. The complete 17,000 square foot exhibition will cost $ 3.3 million and will be seen by at least 10 million adults and children over its 20 year life.
The Museum of Northern Arizona proposes to initiate a two-part project in natural-science education on the Colorado Plateau, with a strong focus on the Native Americans of the region, and especially their children. The project involves, one, the installation of modern geology and biology exhibits that are highly relevant for understanding the natural history of an important area and, two, the development of two closely associated new educational outreach programs, one based on well designed kits for school use and the other involving the training of teachers in the use of those kits.
The Science Museum of Minnesota plans to design, construct and circulate a five-thousand square-foot multidisciplinary exhibit whose purpose is to stimulate public interest in Antarctica and to increase understanding on the continent--its physical history, characteristics and geographies, and the approaches and tools that scientists use to help decipher and understand it. Because of the importance of Antarctica in relation to global environmental systems the exhibit will explore the physical connections between the continent and the rest of the world, as well as some of the scientific, political and economic issues and choices that will affect its future and ours as well. The exhibit will contain traditional displays of geological, biological and other museums specimens, historical and contemporary photographs, models, dioramas and descriptive text, as well as interactive displays and video. The museum will develop the exhibit in association with the Science Museum Exhibit Collaborative, among whose eight members the exhibit will circulate beginning in the spring of 1991.
Field Museum requests $1,033,456 from NSF for the geological and biological science portions of the new, 14,000 square-foot multidisciplinary exhibit on Africa. This $3.45 million permanent reinstallation will capitalize on Field Museum's extensive African collections. We intend to use these collections and other presentational strategies, broad scientific and community input to develop a sensitive and appealing exhibit that will advance central scientific themes in anthropology, geology, ecology, and conservation. A variety of techniques will be used to appeal to the individual interests, needs and learning styles of our diverse audience. Project director will be Michael Spock, Vice President for Public Programs at Field Museum. Co-developers will be Karen Hutt and Fath Ruffins. Exhibit consultants and advisors include Field Museum scientists and educators, and experts in the fields of biology, zoology, and conservation from outside the Museum. An estimated 14 million children and adults will be reached by this ehibit over the next 20 years, and extensive documentation of the exhibit development process will serve as a model for development of other comprehensive exhibits throughout the world.
The Staten Island Children's Museum requests support for an interactive exhibition for children on the topic of water. WATER WATER EVERYWHERE will open in April 1991 and remain on view for three years; a smaller replica of the exhibition will be ready to travel in the Spring of 1992. The first year will allow an initial evaluation period during which both design and content can be improved. The exhibition has dual goals: to provide family audiences, focusing on children, with the materials and context that encourage experimentation and learning, and to educate visitors about an essential and widespread constituent of our world. WATER will present different aspects of this varied subject in six sections: the many forms of water in our world; the properties of water; how living things use water; how water works for us; experiments with water and local water issues. The exhibition will engage children imaginatively, inform, provide opportunities to experiment and learn, and stimulate creativity. Museum public programs and activities will be offered in conjunction with WATER to both extend and enrich the project. WATER will contribute to both children's and inter- generational learning. Its desired outcomes include further development of the Museum's critical thinking skills program, expansion of our renewed Informal Science Education Program, extension of our community service programs and heightening our participation in community issues, such as the environment, through the ecological aspect of the exhibition. By touring the exhibition and producing educational materials based on WATER, the Museum will extend its impact in learning skills, science education and environmental awareness to a scale that is potentially national.
In spring of 1992, Scripps Institution of Oceanography will open a new Aquarium-Museum. The enlarges facility will include a 3700 sq. ft. gallery, the Scripps Hall of Oceanography. Funding is requested for a new exhibit in this gallery, Exploring the Blue Planet, which will offer visitors an overview of the ocean sciences -- to our knowledge, the only major exhibit on oceanography in the United States. The exhibit first introduces visitors to our water planet, followed by a walk through the history of oceanographic research. Visitors are then invited to explore the ocean world as if they were oceanographers themselves, making discoveries as they follow the theme of "water" through the hall, adding components one-by-one to build a global system: first water alone (water chemistry and movements), then adding air (climate and weather), next adding land (seafloor spreading and plate tectonics), and finally adding life (adaptations of organisms to the marine environment). Through interactive exhibits on scientific concepts, coupled with exhibits on related Scripps research projects, visitors gain an appreciation for the process of science and its application to their everyday lives. The conclusion of Exploring the Blue Planet brings together the four realms of water, air, land and life to emphasize the nature of Earth as an interrelated global system. Visitors learn that oceanography, an interdisciplinary science that is global in scale and often international in practice, lends itself to a balanced and comprehensive investigation of global change and our future on earth.
This proposal requests partial funding for the development of a new paleobiology hall at the University of Nebraska State Museum. This project will give students and the general public a dynamic view of the period of time known as the Age of Reptiles. It emphasizes experience with interactive exhibits that focus on concepts of geologic time, how species adapt and change, relative size, scale and time, the activities of scientists as role models, and it provides reinforcement of these experiences for students in the classroom. This project includes the first use in a museum of SemNet, a software program designed for concept mapping and the representation of knowledge networks, which will be used with a videodisc. Prototypes of all interactive exhibits will undergo formative evaluation to establish maximal audience accessibility, ease of use and educational effectiveness. The exhibit concepts will be disseminated throughout the state of Nebraska through mini- versions, teachers in-service training, and scientist-in- residence programs. This project will also be used as a teaching laboratory for the University of Nebraska's graduate program in Museum Studies.
In fall of 1995, the Denver Museum of Natural History (DMNH) will open the Prehistoric Life Exhibits in 17,000 square feet of new exhibition space. The exhibits will be part of an on-going renaissance in paleontology at DMNH that includes research, educational programming, teacher training, and collections management. Visitors will walk through a series of nine life-size, open, prehistoric habitat dioramas -- "enviroramas"-- representing principally regional sites that feature critical events in 3.5 billion-year history of life on Earth. An extension of the Museum's tradition of diorama excellence, the enviroramas will immerse visitors in a multisensory journey, underscoring the message that vast amounts of both time and change have occurred since life began on Earth. Focus area exhibits adjacent to each envirorama will invite visitors to examine fossil evidence and scientific processes. Layered presentations will enable visitors to discover, explore, and study according to their level of interest. Excellent specimens, interpretive exhibitry and hands-on components will allow visitors to gain awareness of past patterns of environmental change and to develop literacy about and appreciation for how science and technology contribute to interpreting the fossil record. A comprehensive evaluation program will ensure that focus area exhibits are effective and provide visitors with "new eyes" for viewing the enviroramas. During exhibit construction, visitors will be able to watch from the viewing area of a state-of-the-art fossil preparation laboratory, completed in l990, as preparators rearticulate the skeletons of Diplodocus, Stegosaurus and other fossils. As part of their Prehistoric Life Exhibits experience, visitors will be able to witness on-going science activities in the laboratory. The National Science Foundation is requested to contribute $1 million over three years toward the $5.3 million Prehistoric Life Exhibits project. The exhibition and associated programming will be a major cultural and educational resource for the Rocky Mountain region , potentially reaching a diverse audience of well over a million Museum visitors and program participants annually.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Brian McLarenRichard StuckyMerry DooleyAlan Espenlaub
The Smithsonian Institution's Office of Environmental Awareness, National Museum of Natural History, and Traveling Exhibition Service are developing a major traveling exhibition, Ocean Planet, that will heighten public awareness of the need for ocean conservation. Ocean Planet will show how our lives are connected to the seas, illustrate the rapidly mounting problems threatening coastlines and open oceans, and feature promising efforts to manage oceans and oceanic resources in a sustainable manner. The exhibition and its accompanying programs will introduce the American public to the science underlying ocean conservation, including the fields of biogeochemistry, economics, fisheries biology, geology, marine anthropology, marine biology, and oceanography. Evaluation studies conducted before, during, and after exhibition development will help make the exhibition and programs more responsive to its audience. Following a six-month showing in the National Museum of Natural History, and modifications based on visitor studies, Ocean Planet will visit eight American cities, introducing millions of museum, aquarium, and science center visitors to environmental issues affecting oceans. The exhibition will be accompanied by an extensive program of educational materials and activities outside of the host site. A program of education grants to the venues on the national tour will encourage collaboration with local educational institutions and community groups. We request $951,050 from the National Science Foundation's Informal Science Education Program to Support exhibition research, designs, evaluation, fabrication, and the development of accompanying educational materials. The additional $3,000,000 needed complete the project will be raised from corporate sources, private foundations, and the Smithsonian Institution.
This exhibit will integrate graphics, artifacts, highly interactive electro-mechanical demonstration devices together with state of the art interactive educational computer technology to demonstrate how probability shapes nature. It will draw its examples from a variety of scientific fields including physics, chemistry, earth sciences, and biology. It is planned as a permanent addition to the Museum's exhibition program, but will be designed to facilitate easy reproduction for individual copies or for circulation as a travelling exhibit. Millions of visitors--families, teachers, children form diverse communities--will gain a first hand aesthetic appreciation of the pattern finding process of scientific investigation as well as a better understanding of the usefulness of mathematics in explaining how the natural world works.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
H. Eugene StanleyDouglas SmithEdwin Taylor