Over the last ten years, out-of-school-time (OST) science programs have multiplied to increase young people’s exposure to science. However, there are still not enough opportunities for long-term engagement, which is essential to move youth from having interest in science to having the skills, knowledge, and self-efficacy to pursue careers in science. This article describes findings from exploratory research conducted to document the experiences of a small group of young women of color who participated in a museum-based OST program during their middle and high school years.
Learning to see inequity in science is critical to anyone who is actively encouraging young people to invest their education, career, and life in the discipline. If the culture of science is grossly inequitable, why should students take the risk of entering this discipline over careers in other arenas? Many scholarly publications from the fields of psychology, science education, and sociology have described inequities in science; proposed theoretical frameworks for understanding them; and explored practical strategies for addressing such inequities, but progress in jettisoning these inequities
This article presents research relating to how science museum educators perceive their roles, identity, and practice. This qualitative study examines: (1) what brings museum educators to and sustains them in their profession; (2) how museum educators view their roles and work; and (3) what knowledge, skills, and attitudes museum educators identify as critical to their work. Findings show that museum educators have a strong value system that has attracted them to and sustains them in this profession, including a need to "make a difference." They primarily view themselves as educators and get
Building on and extending existing research, this article proposes a 4-phase model of interest development. The model describes 4 phases in the development and deepening of learner interest: triggered situational interest, maintained situational interest, emerging (less-developed) individual interest, and well-developed individual interest. Affective as well as cognitive factors are considered. Educational implications of the proposed model are identified.
The authors seek to investigate whether studying the arts makes people more creative, and by extension, whether studying the arts builds creative thinking skills that can be deployed outside the arts. They do so through a series of meta-analyses examining existing literature, and find that the presence of an association between studying the arts and creative thinking depends on experimental design and the form of creativity measured.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Erik MogaKristin BurgerLois HetlandEllen Winner
By designing accountability systems that fully embrace the notion of afterschool programs as learning organizations and by using research from organizational development, education, and youth development to create effective learning environments, funders and sponsors can help programs to improve quality—and therefore, to succeed in their goal of achieving better outcomes for young people.
This article highlights some of the diverse ways that different types of museums use place-based education to further their missions and benefit their audiences. Authors include Janet Petitpas, Assistant Director of the Bay Area Discovery Museum, Maggie Russell-Ciardi, Education Coordinator for the Lower East Side Tenement Museum, Lori Salles, Exhibit Manager at the Turtle Bay Exploration Park, and Mary Jo Sutton, Director of Exhibitions at the Bay Area Discovery Museum.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Janet PetitpasMaggie Russell-CiardiLori SallesMary Jo Sutton
Collaboration is a prerequisite for the sustainability of interagency programs, particularly those programs initially created with the support of time-limited grant-funding sources. From the perspective of evaluators, however, assessing collaboration among grant partners is often difficult. It is also challenging to present collaboration data to stakeholders in a way that is meaningful. In this article, the authors introduce the Levels of Collaboration Scale, which was developed from existing models and instruments. The authors extend prior work on measuring collaboration by exploring the
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Bruce FreyJill LohmeierStephen LeeNona Tollefson