HR: 11:25h
AN: ED22A-05    [Abstracts]
TI: Education Partnerships: Museums as Mediators Between Science, Educators and the General Public
AU: * Miller, M K
EM: marym@exploratorium.edu
AF: Exploratorium, 3601 Lyon Street, San Francisco, CA 94123, United States
AB: The Exploratorium, a museum of science, art and human perception in San Francisco, has been partnering with polar scientists to bring their work to the general public, students and teachers before and during the International Polar Year, 2007-9. Last year, Exploratorium producers connected with scientists on the ANDRILL sediment coring project out of McMurdo, Antarctica in a series of live programs and web postings that were broadcast on the museum floor and on the Internet. This work builds on an NSF-funded project in 2001 that brought four museum educators to Antarctica on a six-week Web expedition and will continue over the next two field seasons in Antarctica and the Arctic field season in summer 2008. Over the next 18 months, the Exploratorium's "Ice Stories" will partner museum media and web producers with polar scientists working in the field to bring their research to the Internet and museum audience via live Webcasts, video clips, blogs, podcasts, and other media platforms. The museum will curate polar field reports from scientists and educators into a continuously updated Web portal on the Exploratorium's award-winning Website and highlight the ongoing research in museum programming, floor demonstrations, and exhibits. There is excellent potential for these partnerships between formal and informal science to be expanded by creating additional links with formal educators in classroom and out-of-classroom settings.
UR: http://www.exploratorium.edu/poles
DE: 0805 Elementary and secondary education
DE: 0810 Post-secondary education
DE: 0815 Informal education
DE: 0855 Diversity
SC: Education and Human Resources [ED]
MN: 2007 Fall Meeting