Omaha’s Henry Doorly Zoo and Aquarium has been a strong and active partner in education for over 40 years, educating 1.7 million visitors annually. The zoo has become a leader in both informal and formal education by pioneering many science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) initiatives. In 1996 the zoo moved from being a partner with others to becoming a true collaborator with a diverse group of education institutions. The zoo discovered that a successful partnership requires multiple organizations to come together and share resources for a cause. In partnering with school
This poster was presented at the 2016 Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) PI Meeting held in Bethesda, MD on February 29-March 2. Through a unique university-zoo partnership, Project TRUE engages New York City high school students in authentic urban ecology field research in the surrounding metropolitan area. Central to the project design is a tiered mentorship model, in which Fordham University professors mentor undergraduate and graduate ecology students, who in turn mentor high school students from communities underrepresented in STEM fields. Project TRUE also pairs the university
This report details a four-month snapshot summative evaluation of the Bridging the Gap (BTG) program at the Wildlife Conservation Society. A snapshot summative evaluation in this instance means that the evaluation occurred as the program was concluding, but was not intended to evaluate the totality of the three-year program. The study sought to 1) better understand the effect the program had on teen participants' attitudes on any element associated with the program (STEM, careers, college, zoos, etc.); and 3) identify components of the program that were particularly successful or effective.
The 3-year Bridging the Gap program, developed and implemented by the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), was designed to educate minority youth from New York City (NYC) about education and career opportunities available in wildlife and conservation sciences. This National Science Foundation (NSF) Innovative Technology Experiences for Students and Teachers (ITEST)-funded program provided almost 150 minority high school students with conservation knowledge, practical information about the college application process and college life, and long-term support through continued contact with WCS
The Wildlife Conservation Society and Good Shepherd Services (a youth development and education agency) are implementing and evaluating a school-to-career model program that consists of afterschool and weekend programming for high school students at four New York City area zoos and an aquarium, followed by post-participation tracking, support, and mentoring. The goal is to promote affective, cognitive and behavioral outcomes among 150 low-income minority youth necessary to pursue careers in the wildlife sciences.
The Bridging the Gap project is (1) developing a science career program that includes hands-on, technology-enriched, science learning experiences at zoos/aquaria; career building services, mentoring, and long-term tracking and support, (2) forming a community of minority students who have the knowledge and skills to pursue wildlife careers, (3) generating research findings on the short-term and long-term effectiveness of the program, and (4) disseminating information about the project's resources and findings to other informal science education institutions around the nation for replication. The evaluation plan measures a variety of outputs, outcomes and impacts that include short-term and long-term cognitive and affective variables. Data collection methods include student activity monitoring and pre-post testing.
The project addresses a compelling personnel issue documented by the American Zoo and Aquarium Association - the small number of minority science professionals working in zoos and aquariums. Because few programs currently exist to help minority students enter the wildlife science professions, this project fills an important programmatic need and serves as a model workforce program that can be replicated by other informal science education organizations around the country. The project's key strategic impact is its capacity to broaden participation in the wildlife sciences by expanding the science professional pipeline beginning in high school.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Karen TingleyChanda BennettDon LisowyBrian JohnsonEmily StoethCourtney Wiggins
To address the lack of diversity that exists within the fields of wildlife and conservation science, the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) developed "Bridging the Gap," a three-year youth development initiative for New York City high school students. Over the course of three cohorts, "Bridging the Gap" served 150 students from communities underrepresented in the sciences. The project aimed to help participants see the relevance of science study to their own lives and support them in pursuing a career in wildlife conservation or another science. Participants engaged in activities including
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Karen TingleyBrian JohnsonEmily StoethCourtney Wiggins
This poster was presented at the 2016 Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) PI Meeting held in Bethesda, MD on February 29-March 2. The SCIENCES project aims to create a STEM ecosystem in Fuller Park, a chronically, severely under-resourced urban community in Chicago.
The Florida Aquarium will create a Gulf-focused seafood education program that will deliver current information on seafood choices that help ensure abundant future populations of fish. The aquarium will form an advisory council to provide ongoing Gulf seafood recommendations, produce a pocket-sized "Gulf Seafood Guide," refine and expand its Restaurant Partner Program, create a Commercial Partner Program for non-restaurant businesses, increase the sustainable seafood educational content on its website, and host World Oceans Day/Seafood Now Awareness Days to reach an even broader audience. The combination of educational products and events will enable the aquarium to reach the public with current information and allow consumers to take a positive role in helping preserve the Gulf through their purchases.
The University of California, Davis Tahoe Environmental Research Center (TERC), UC Davis W.M. Keck Center for Active Visualization in the Earth Sciences (KeckCAVES), ECHO Lake Aquarium and Science Center (ECHO), UC Berkeley Lawrence Hall of Science (LHS), and the Institute for Learning Innovation (ILI) will study how 3-D visualizations can most effectively be used to improve general public understanding of freshwater lake ecosystems and Earth science processes through the use of immersive three-dimensional (3-D) visualizations of lake and watershed processes, supplemented by tabletop science activity stations. Two iconic lakes will be the focus of this study: Lake Tahoe in California and Nevada, and Lake Champlain in Vermont and New York, with products readily transferable to other freshwater systems and education venues. The PI will aggregate and share knowledge about how to effectively utilize 3-D technologies and scientific data to support learning from immersive 3-D visualizations, and how other hands-on materials can be combined to most effectively support visitor learning about physical, biological and geochemical processes and systems. The project will be structured to iteratively test, design, and implement 3-D visualizations in both concurrent and staggered development. The public will be engaged in the science behind water quality and ecosystem health; lake formation; lake foodwebs; weather and climate; and the role and impact of people on the ecosystem. A suite of publicly available learning resources will be designed and developed on freshwater ecosystems, including immersive 3-D visualizations; portable science stations with multimedia; a facilitator's guide for docent training; and a Developer's Manual to allow future informal science education venues. Project partners are organized into five teams: 1) Content Preparation and Review: prepare and author content including writing of storyboards, narratives, and activities; 2) 3-D Scientific Visualizations: create visualization products using spatial data; 3) Science Station: plan, design, and produce hands-on materials; 4) Website and Multimedia: produce a dissemination strategy for professional and public audiences; 4) Evaluation: conduct front-end, formative, and summative evaluation of both the 3-D visualizations and science activity stations. The summative evaluation will utilize a mixed methods approach, using both qualitative and quantitative methods, and will include focus groups, semi-structured interviews, web surveys, and in-depth interviews. Leveraging 3-D tools, high-quality visual displays, hands-on activities, and multimedia resources, university-based scientists will work collaboratively with informal science education professionals to extend the project's reach and impact to an audience of 400,000 visitors, including families, youth, school field trip groups, and tourists. The project will implement, evaluate, and disseminate knowledge of how 3-D visualizations and technologies can be designed and configured to effectively support visitor engagement and learning about physical, biological and geochemical processes and systems, and will evaluate how these technologies can be transferred more broadly to other informal science venues and schools for future career and workforce development in these critical STEM areas.
Based on the number of visitors annually, zoos and aquariums are among the most popular venues for informal STEM learning in the United States and the United Kingdom. Most research into the impacts of informal STEM learning experiences at zoos and aquariums has focused on short-term changes in knowledge, attitudes and behaviors. This Science Learning+ project will identify the opportunities for and barriers to researching the long-term impacts of informal STEM learning experiences at zoos and aquariums. The project will address the following overarching research question: What are and how do we measure the long-term impacts of an informal STEM learning experience at a zoo and aquarium? While previous research has documented notable results, understanding the long-term impacts of zoo and aquarium learning experiences will provide a deeper and more nuanced understanding of the impact of these programs on STEM knowledge, skills and application. This study will use a participatory process to identify: (1) the range of potential long-term impacts of informal science learning experiences at zoos and aquariums; (2) particular activities that foster these impacts; and (3) opportunities for and barriers to measuring those impacts. First, an in-depth literature review will document previous research efforts to date within the zoo and aquarium community. Second, a series of consultative workshops (both in-person and online) will gather ideas and input from practitioners, researchers, and other stakeholders in zoo and aquarium education. The consultative workshops will focus on two questions in particular: (1) What are the different types and characteristics of informal science learning experiences that take place at zoos and aquariums? and (2) What are the long-term impacts zoos and aquariums are aiming to have on visitors in relation to knowledge, attitudes, skills and behaviors/actions? Finally, visitor surveys at zoos and aquariums in the US and UK will be conducted to gather input on what visitors believe are the long-term impacts of an informal STEM learning opportunity at a zoo or aquarium. The data gathered through all of these activities will inform the design of a five-year, mixed-methods study to investigate long-term impacts and associated indicators of an informal STEM learning experience at a zoo or aquarium. One of the aims of the five-year study will be to test instruments that could eventually be used by the global zoo and aquarium community to measure the long-term impacts of informal STEM learning programs. Designing tools to better understand the long-term impacts of informal STEM learning at zoos and aquariums will contribute to our ability to measure STEM learning outcomes. Additional benefits include improved science literacy and STEM skills amongst visitors over time and an understanding of how education programs contribute to wildlife conservation worldwide.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Brian JohnsonStanford UniversityLancaster UniversitySarah ThomasNicole ArdoinMurray Saunders
Project TRUE (Teens Researching Urban Ecology) was a summer research experience for New York City youth that focused on strengthening their STEM interest, skills, and ultimately, increasing diversity in STEM fields. Through a partnership between an informal science institution (the Wildlife Conservation Society) and a university (Fordham University), 200 high school students conducted urban ecology research at one of four zoos in New York City under the guidance of STEM mentors. A unique feature of Project TRUE was its near-peer mentorship model, in which university professors mentored graduate urban ecology students, who mentored undergraduate students, who mentored high school students Science research projects focused on urban ecology topics, with high school students identifying their own research questions that were nested within the undergraduate mentor’s larger research question, thereby establishing a sense of ownership. Youth collected and analyzed their own data and the experience culminated in the creation of research posters, with teams presenting their posters to the public at a student science symposium.
This project was funded by the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program, which seeks to advance new approaches to, and evidence-based understanding of, the design and development of STEM learning in informal environments. We studied the impacts of two key parts of the program – conducting authentic science research and near-peer mentorship – on the STEM trajectories of almost 200 high school students who participated in the program from 2015 to 2018. The research explored short-term outcomes immediately after the program and followed up with students multiple years after participation to understand the medium-term impacts of the experience during and after the transition from high school to college.
As popular visitor destinations, zoos play a vital role in enhancing understanding of animal biology, conservation, and biodiversity. But what do visitors already understand? This study examined visitors’ knowledge of animal biology and their understanding of how human activity may affect biodiversity. The findings led to a modification of a model that illustrates visitors’ levels of understanding of animal biology and the conservation of biodiversity.