The National Center for Science & Civic Engagement (NCSCE) contracted RK&A, Inc. (RK&A) to conduct a summative evaluation of Partnership Champions: SENCER-ISE and Professional Development Through Mentoring to Enhance Learning Environments (Partnership Champions), an IMLS-funded project. Partnership Champions builds upon NCSCE’s SENCER-ISE initiative, which supports ten cross-sector partnerships between museums and higher education institutions. With the addition of Partnership Champions, five past SENCER-ISE partners take on the role of mentors to a new group of partners.
In Fall 2016, RK&A
Transforming Communities provides an overview of the agency mission, vision, goals, and objectives, and includes highlights of IMLS initiatives and projects.
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Institute of Museum and Library Services
"Strengthening Networks, Sparking Change: Museums and Libraries as Community Catalysts" combines findings from a literature scan and input from the library, museum and community revitalization fields with case studies about the experiences and vision of museums and libraries working to spur change in their communities. It describes the complementary conceptual frameworks of social wellbeing and collective impact and explains how libraries and museums can use these concepts to partner with community-based organizations, government agencies and other cultural or educational organizations. It
The Let’s Talk project examined what we know and don’t know about dialogue-based programs in museums. Through research, a symposium and an experimental graduate course, the project created a set of priorities and resources for moving dialogue work forward, developed new relationships across STEM based and cultural based museums and prepared a pool of pre-professionals to enter the field with knowledge of the value and potential of dialogue. The project ends with a call for further articulation and appropriate measurement of the intended and possible impacts and further development of field
NatureStart Network brought together early childhood educators and environmental educators to support nature play, exploration, and inquiry for young children and their families within urban environments. Project partners included the Forest Preserves of Cook County and two established Head Start programs in the Chicago area, Mary Crane Center and El Valor. The foundation of the project was a series of three two-day professional learning sessions that took place over an eighteen month period. Through hands-on, collaborative learning and reflection activities, the participating educators
Science from the Start (SFTS) was a two-year early childhood program funded by IMLS, with matching funds from the Sciencenter. The goal of SFTS was to empower teachers, parents, and caregivers to do more science with their students and children. Although the SFTS program continues today,this final summary report describes the results of the initial two-year pilot project only.
With funding from the U.S. Institute of Museum and Library Services, the Association of Children’s Museums and the University of Washington’s Museology Graduate Program are leading a two phased project focused on developing a collective, evidence-based body of knowledge in order to better define the learning value of children’s museums. The first phase of the project titled, Building a Field-Wide Research Agenda, began in the fall of 2012. The goal was to generate a field-wide research agenda for children’s museums. In the fall of 2013 researchers, evaluators, educators, administrators, academics, contractors, and other affiliate professionals from the children’s museum field gathered in Washington D.C. for a two-day symposium which was followed by a series of webinars intended to invite broader participation from the whole children’s museum field. As a result the Learning Value of Children’s Museums Research Agenda was developed. The second phase of the project titled, Building a Practicing Research Network in the Children’s Museum Field, started in October 2014. The goal is to develop a sustainable infrastructure for cross-institutional research activities guided by the recently developed Learning Value of Children’s Museums Research Agenda. In the winter of 2015 a cohort of ten children’s museums was selected to form a network working to identify collaborative research projects that respond to the priorities in the research agenda, conduct research projects across multiple institutions in the research network, and aggregate data to share with the broader children's museum field. The work of the network is ongoing and new information will be made available to the field as we progress.
Cañada College will implement the STEM 4 ECE program, which will engage early childhood education (ECE) students in activities to increase their understanding of a comfort with STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) subjects. Through partnerships with the San Mateo County Office of Education, the Redwood City Public Library, and with ECE and STEM faculty, the program will offer workshops, online tutorials, and one-on-one support to assist ECE students in using library research to incorporate STEM topics in their coursework. The program will also expand the role of the library to serve as a place for interdisciplinary faculty collaboration while providing STEM resources to groups that have historically had limited access to them, specifically in minority communities.
The Allegheny County Library Association will partner with ASSET, Inc. to provide professional development in principles of STEM education (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) and inquiry-based practices to youth service librarians representing 45 libraries. Participating librarians will learn strategies to incorporate these concepts into the design and implementation of programming in a library setting. In addition to hosting a series of workshops over the grant period, the project will develop an online community of practice and specific training for library directors and trustees on the importance of incorporating STEM principles into library programming. Upon completion of this training, participating librarians will be better equipped to design and implement engaging STEM programming that will help students to supplement in-school STEM learning, which research suggests may lead students to pursue STEM-related careers.
The number of Latinos and Native Americans represented in library and information science professions is extremely low. The University of Arizona School of Information Resources and Library Science will address this inequity in its Connected Learning in Digital Heritage Curation project, which focuses on archives and special collections, medical librarianship, and public librarianship. The project will educate 24 culturally competent master’s degree students to serve Latino and Native American communities in the digital world. Students will gain hands-on experience working as graduate assistants with project partners: the University of Arizona Libraries, Center for Creative Photography, Arizona Health Sciences Library, Pima County Public Library, Arizona Historical Society, Arizona State Museum, Labriola National American Indian Data Center, American Indian Film Gallery, Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research and the Arizona State Library, Archives and Public Records.
The Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History will enhance its staff capacity and train current educational staff in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) education delivery, both of which will increase its ability to deliver interpretive tours and programming around the newly opened permanent exhibition, “Inspiring Minds: African Americans in Science and Technology.” The project will include hiring a full-time STEM educator to work with education and archival staff to create and implement a family learning approach to the sciences in the rich context of African American history and culture. A training facilitator will develop a cohort of STEM interns and train current staff educators to present STEM learning experiences. At the conclusion of the project, the museum will have increased staff capacity and widespread expansion and integration of STEM opportunities for the youth, families, and schools of Detroit.
The Amistad Research Center will hire a project archivist to process 15 archival collections highlighting the accomplishments of African Americans in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) professions. An inventory of the collections will be created and selected materials emphasizing multigenerational African American achievement in STEM professions will be digitized to improve public access. Highlights of the collection will be shared through social media and Amistad’s blog. The project supports the Amistad Research Center’s role as a repository of collections documenting African Americans in STEM professions while providing an emerging archivist valuable experience in the evaluation, organization, preservation, and description of complex archival collections.