Science communication that connects STEM-based professionals with various publics are often designed and implemented with a range of multiple outcomes in mind which can influence the effectiveness of engagement efforts. Scientists, science communicators, and STEM professionals can be more effective at engaging diverse audiences if they align their engagement strategies with their communication goals and target audience.
About this resource:
This is a practice brief produced by CAISE's Broadening Participation in STEM Task Force to help informal STEM education (ISE) and science
The varied and diverse ways in which people engage with STEM are often not acknowledged due to the historical representation of STEM in school, industry, and society. These cultural models of “who does STEM” discourage many who don’t identify as male and/ or white, or who don’t see themselves as highly intelligent, from choosing or identifying with STEM. To broaden participation, the field needs to define STEM more comprehensively so that people can recognize the ways they already engage in, use, and contribute to STEM disciplines, even if they don’t conform to cultural stereotypes associated
When everybody engaging in STEM is expected to adhere to dominant cultural norms established by the populations that have historically participated in and institutionalized STEM—that is, male, white, western, and privileged, some may feel like outsiders, even though others will find them familiar and comfortable. This can shape perceptions about who has expertise and/or belongs in STEM fields. STEM programs and science representations must encourage and support participation by leveraging audiences' personal experiences and cultural practices.
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This is a practice
Science communicators and educators need strategies to account for the differences in ways that learners build on prior knowledge and experiences, and position these differences as strengths, rather than as weaknesses. Science communicators and STEM educators can more effectively engage their audiences by applying asset-based approaches in their activities and strategies.
About this resource:
This is a practice brief produced by CAISE's Broadening Participation in STEM Task Force to help informal STEM education (ISE) and science communication groups reflect on and strengthen their
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Raychelle BurksSunshine MenezesCenter for Advancement of Informal Science Education (CAISE)
Though many communities are now undertaking collective efforts to transform who participates in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM), the informal science education and science communication sectors are largely peripheral to these initiatives.
A task force assembled by the Center for the Advancement of Informal STEM Education (CAISE) spent 18 months examining how the public engagement with STEM sector typically presents and represents STEM, and deliberated on whether or not it does so in truly inclusive ways that can contribute to efforts to broaden participation. In this
To help informal STEM education (ISE) and science communication groups reflect on and strengthen their efforts to broaden participation in STEM, CAISE’s Broadening Participation in STEM Task Force developed a suite of professional development tools.
If you are a staff leader or trainer working on broadening participation, these resources can help support your work. You can use them to plan and lead reflective discussions about current practices, with an eye to developing goals, strategies, and priorities that can make your ISE and science communication work more inclusive.
Toolkit
Informal STEM education institutions seek to engage broader cross sections of their communities to address inequities in STEM participation and remain relevant in a multicultural society. In this chapter, we advance the role that evaluation can play in helping the field adopt more inclusive practices and achieve greater equity than at present through evaluation that addresses sociopolitical contexts and reflects the perspectives and values of non-dominant communities. To do this for specific projects, we argue that evaluation should privilege the voices and lived experiences of non-dominant
The free‐choice nature of informal STEM education (ISE) makes rigorous and contextually appropriate evaluation of outcomes challenging. Traditional measures such as surveys and interviews have been widely used in ISE evaluations, but they have limitations: They are typically self‐reports that are susceptible to the reactive effects of measurement, and they tend to intrude upon the participant's learning experience. The ISE field needs measures that capture outcomes in more direct and less obtrusive ways, permitting triangulation with multiple measures on outcomes. In this chapter, we define
We define "informal STEM education" and explain some of the reasons its outcomes are so inherently challenging to evaluate, including the critical need for ecological validity and the fact that many informal learning experiences are low-visibility and opportunistic. We go on to highlight significant advances in the field, starting with the fundamental embracing of learning outcomes that go well beyond narrow measures of knowledge and skills, to include interest, engagement, and identity-building. Within that framework, we note the development of shared constructs and shared instruments
Antarctic Dinosaurs: A Giant Screen Film and Outreach Project aims to leverage the popularity and charisma of dinosaurs to draw museum audiences into a captivating educational journey, revealing the history and transformation of Antarctica and the planet’s polar ecosystems, and exploring the forces that continue to shape the continent. In addition to bringing to life a wealth of unfamiliar dinosaurs, amphibians and proto-mammals, this project will journey beyond the bones to reveal a more nuanced, multi-disciplinary interpretation of paleontology and Antarctica’s profound changes.
Centered
U!Scientist is an in-gallery touch table adaptation of the popular online citizen science project Galaxy Zoo. Taking advantage of the social opportunities in a museum setting, the project aims not only to enhance visitors’ science self-efficacy but also to encourage visitors to discuss their choices with friends and family.
This poster was presented at the 2019 NSF AISL Principal Investigators Meeting.
With stories of struggle and dramatic breakthroughs, science has incredible potential to interest the public. However, as the rhetoric of outrage surrounds controversies over science policy there is an urgent need for credible, trusted voices that frame science issues in a way that resonates with a diverse public. A network of informal educators, park rangers, museum docents and designers, and zoo and aquarium interpreters are prepared to do so during millions of visits a year; just where science stories are most meaningfully told—in the places where members of the public are open to learning