Museums and galleries collect more visitor data today than ever before. But how much of it gives us real insight into visitors motivations, behaviour, experiences and responses? And how much of it simply ticks a box on a funding form? Commissioned by some of the UK’s leading institutions, including Tate, The British Museum, V&A and the Imperial War Museum North, Morris Hargreaves McIntyre has tackled this insight deficit head on. In doing so, we have helped these organisations to move beyond the data routinely collected to get to the knowledge they actually need.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Morris Hargreaves McIntyre
resourceprojectProfessional Development, Conferences, and Networks
The Coalition for Science After School (CSAS) was established in 2004 in response to the growing need for more STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) learning opportunities in out-of-school time. CSAS sought to build this field by uniting STEM education goals with out-of-school time opportunities and a focus on youth development. Over a decade of work, CSAS Steering Committee members, staff and partners advocated for STEM in out-of-school-time settings, convened leaders, and created resources to support this work. CSAS leadership decided to conclude CSAS operations in 2014, as the STEM in out-of-school time movement had experienced tremendous growth of programming and attention to science-related out-of-school time opportunities on a national level. In its ten-year strategic plan, CSAS took as its vision the full integration of the STEM education and out-of-school time communities to ensure that quality out-of-school time STEM opportunities became prevalent and available to learners nationwide. Key CSAS activities included: (1) Setting and advancing a collective agenda by working with members to identify gaps in the field, organizing others to create solutions that meet the needs, identifying policy needs in the field and supporting advocates to advance them; (2) Developing and linking committed communities by providing opportunities for focused networking and learning through conferences, webinars, and other outreach activities; and (3) Identifying, collecting, capturing, and sharing information and available research and resources in the field. The leadership of the Coalition for Science After School is deeply grateful to the funders, partners, supporters, and constituents that worked together to advance STEM in out-of-school time during the last decade, and that make up today's rich and varied STEM in out-of-school time landscape. We have much to be proud of, but as a movement there is much more work to be done. As this work continues to expand and deepen, it is appropriate for the Coalition for Science After School to step down as the many other organizations that have emerged over the last decade take on leadership for the critical work that remains to be done. A timeline and summary of CSAS activities, products, and accomplishments is available for download on this page. All resources noted in the narrative are also available for download below.
In October 2005, the National Science Foundation brought members of its nanoscale science and engineering education (NSEE) projects to Arlington, VA for a 2-day workshop to explore the status of on-going efforts and to forge collaborations at the national level that would facilitate future efforts. NSF currently funds NSEE projects through the Division of Elementary, Secondary, and Informal Education (ESIE), the Directorate for Engineering as part of the Nanoscale Science and Engineering Centers (NSEC), National Nanotechnology Infrastructure Network (NNIN), the Network for Computational
This monograph, the final report of the 21st Century Literacy Summit held in April 2005, presents an action plan for this emerging field applicable to higher education, K-12 education, policy makers, media & the arts, and research, and details the strategic priorities and specific recommendations for these sectors that were the summit's major outcomes.
This report offers an assessment of environmental literacy in America that is both sobering and hopeful. This summary of almost a decade of NEETF (National Environmental Education & Training Foundation) collaboration with Roper Reports provides a loud wake-up call to the environmental education community, to community leaders, and to influential specialists ranging from physicians to weathercasters. At a time when Americans are confronted with increasingly challenging environmental choices, we learn that our citizenry is by and large both uninformed and misinformed.
To provide meaningful science experiences for students, educators need quality science experiences themselves from which to draw. Informal learning contexts, such as museums, are well positioned to provide educators with these professional development experiences. We investigated the impact museum-created professional development experiences had on 54 elementary teachers. Quantitative data were collected through an exit survey and qualitative data through survey questions and interviews. We found a significant difference between how teachers rated these workshops and how they rated other
In the past decade, we have seen an increased focus on measuring the impact of zoos, aquariums, and other free-choice learning environments on the conservation-related knowledge, attitudes and behavior of the visiting public. However, no such studies have been conducted on the impact of such environments on the staff working in these facilities – the very staff that in turn interact with the public on a daily basis. Clearly these interactions are recognized as being important; for example, the thousands of staff employed by Disney’s Animal Kingdom are regularly provided with conservation
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Amy GroffDonna LockhartJacqueline OgdenLynn Dierking
resourceprojectProfessional Development, Conferences, and Networks
The Astronomical Society of the Pacific (ASP) will develop and test a new model of informal science education professional development to help small museums increase the public's knowledge and interest in astronomy. The lead collaborators in addition to ASP are the National Optical Astronomy Observatory (NOAO) and the Association of Science Technology Centers (ASTC). The project deliverables include 1) workshops for approximately 240 informal science education (ISE) practitioners in 180 small ISE institutions delivered both on-site and through distance learning 2) hands-on astronomy activity toolkits and 3) an on-going "community of practice" network. The project development team includes representatives from small ISE institutions (Randall Museum, CA; Lakeview Museum of Arts and Science, IL; Stamford Museum & Nature Center, CT) as well as others. This project has the potential for making a strategic impact on the ISE field with its research on the use of distance learning compared to on-site professional development workshops
This paper discusses how museums can encourage chaperones to facilitate deeper experiences for students during field trips. The authors describe how the California Science Center's ThinkSCIENCE! Pathways field trip program addresses this issue. Pathways asks chaperones to become facilitators by using "chaperone sheets," sets of materials containing gallery-specific questions, activities, and points of interest to help chaperones engage students in discussion. This article cites findings from a rigorous formative evaluation of these chaperone sheets and the program in general.
This article discusses a study that investigated teacher perceptions of group visits to a science museum in Taiwan. Thirty teachers who traveled with large groups were interviewed about two issues: the involvement of travel agents and the size of the group. The findings indicate that responsibility and administrative details were the primary reasons that teachers chose to travel with a larger sized group, or with assistance provided by a travel agency. Curriculum fit was not the first consideration in planning field trips. The study also found teachers' ability and attitudes to using museums
This research study involves collaboration between researchers at the University of Maryland, College Park and Bowie State University, an HBCU, to examine a multi-component pre-service model for preparing minority students to teach upper elementary and middle level science. The treatment consists of (1) focused recruitment efforts by the collaborating universities; (2) a pre-service science content course emphasizing inquiry and the mathematics of data management; (3) an internship in an after school program serving minority students; (4) field placements in Prince Georges County minority-serving professional development schools; and (5) mentoring support during the induction year. The research agenda will examine each aspect of the intervention using quantitative and qualitative methods and a small number of case studies.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
James McginnisSpencer BensonScott Dantley
This monograph has been created by the TEAMS (Traveling Exhibits At Museums of Science) Collaborative, a group of seven small U.S. science centers, to share experiences, observations, and lessons learned with the broader science museum field. Our intention is to help others who might be interested in forming a collaborative to work though some key issues, most of which have to do with the relationships between collaborative members, rather than more technical matters. We hope that this will provide a vision for others as to how collaboration among science centers can work. The monograph looks
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Charles TrautmannMark St. JohnDavid Goudy