ASTC Intensives are a chance for conference attendees to participate in focused learning experiences on a single topic, as well as to connect and network with peers with similar occupational and topical interests—before the start of the main conference.
All Preconference ASTC Intensives have limited enrollment and require preregistration. For ASTC Virtual 2020 Annual Conference, all preconference intensives are available for $15 per event for both members and non-members (unless otherwise noted).
Please note that you must be registered for the Annual Conference before signing up for Preconference ASTC Intensives.
Registration for Preconference ASTC Intensives closed on October 9.
FOR CHIEF EXECUTIVES ONLY: Chief Executive Preconference Intensive: Budgets
Tuesday, October 13, 2020 – Wednesday, October 14, 2020
11:00 am-1:00 pm ET (each day)
This half-day program will be your opportunity “get real” on budgets with other chief executives of science and technology centers and museums.
Full Description:
This half-day program will be your opportunity “get real” on budgets with other chief executives of science and technology centers and museums. Bring your organization’s budget and discuss the practicalities of you are approaching budgeting, and how you are prioritizing tough decisions in a time of diminishing resources.
Co-Leaders:
- Lesley Lewis (Former CEO/Consultant)
- Charlie Trautmann (Director Emeritus, Sciencenter)
Track: Leadership and Professional Development
Target Audience: Chief executives
Preregistration required. Limited capacity. Fee: $15 per person.
BY INVITE ONLY: NASA’s Universe of Learning Informal Network Virtual Convening
Tuesday, October 13, 2020 – Wednesday, October 14, 2020
1:00 pm-5:00 pm ET (each day)
This preconference workshop is designed to bring together program model participants with Universe of Learning (UoL) organizing partners and create a space where they can share insights and foster engagement with one another.
Full Description:
This preconference workshop is designed to bring together program model participants with Universe of Learning (UoL) organizing partners and create a space where they can foster engagement with one another. Share insights, highlights, and new ideas around the programming and discuss the next five years.
Facilitators:
- Timothy Rhue (Senior Informal Education Specialist, Space Telescope Science Institute)
- Mary Dussault (Program Manager, Harvard Smithsonian Institute for Astrophysics)
- Yesenia Perez (Informal Education Specialist II, Space Telescope Science Institute)
- Erika A. Wright (Education Specialist, Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian)
Track: Informal Education and Lifelong Learning
Target Audience: Applied (familiar with a topic or mid-career professionals)
Topical Tags: Future Planning; Diversity and Equity; Partnerships
Preregistration required. Limited capacity. Fee: $15 per person.
Leveraging the Power of Science Centers to Reimagine Future Community Climate Solutions and Resilience
Tuesday, October 13, 2020
1:00 pm-5:00 pm ET
Come learn about new approaches science centers are taking to engage their audiences and work with their local communities to advance climate resilience efforts.
Full Description:
Come learn how cultural institutions accelerate and support sustainable development and community-based climate solutions. Communities across the country are on the frontlines in dealing with increasing climate impacts. Making the case for climate action is one of the leading challenges cities face to undertaking ambitious resilience, adaptation and mitigation planning. Science centers have a high degree of public trust, serve as the primary incubators of social innovation, generate new theories and experiments with sustainable living, and have robust public engagement strategies and support. They are also able to catalyze effective partnerships and coordinate the efforts needed in order to sustain multi-decadal changes in cities and their wider communities.
This half-day workshop reimagines the future of science museums to advance climate literacy partnerships for cross-sector collaboration at city/sub-national scales to ensure communities can reduce greenhouse gas emissions and exposure to climate risks. The workshop will contribute to the efforts to advance the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers National Strategic Plan by listening to informal education leaders from diverse communities about how education and community engagement support climate actions. Come learn about National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association-funded and related projects that enable climate resilience through community partnerships, including increased knowledge of climate change impacts, teens becoming champions for resilient communities, citizen-science and public dialogue forums, integration of art, and community-driven decision-making to build climate resilience. Additionally, participants will be introduced to the training model, National Network for Ocean and Climate Change Interpretation, and explore tested resources to strengthen their voices and to increase our collective impact in promoting climate action.
Facilitators:
- Frank Niepold (Education Coordinator, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration)
- Carrie McDougall (Senior Program Manager, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration)
- Bart Merrick (Education Coordinator, Environmental Science Training Center, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration)
Track: Leadership and Professional Development
Target Audience: Applied (familiar with a topic or mid-career professionals)
Topical Tags: Community Impact; Making the Case for Science Centers; Diversity and Equity
Preregistration required. Limited capacity. Fee: $15 per person.
Unpacking Identities: Exploring the Impact of Staff Experiences on Youth
Tuesday, October 13, 2020 – Wednesday, October 14, 2020
2:00 pm-4:00 pm ET (each day)
This period of isolation and social unrest highlights a need to reflect, develop an understanding of power, privilege, and oppression (PPO), explore issues in the workplace and analyze program structures to develop strategies for making change.
Full Description:
This period of isolation, social unrest, and uncertainty has shown that it is more important than ever to bring our whole authentic selves to our interactions with our young people. When managing, coordinating, and facilitating programs for young people, we often forget the impact that our own fears, traumas, and experiences with power, privilege and oppression can have on the youth we serve. As we work to help young people develop both the hard and soft skills necessary to negotiate the increasing complexity of our societies, we must also equip them with tools to help them recognize and navigate power dynamics, acknowledge and understand instances of privilege, and combat oppressive systems. First, we must look inward, within the structures of our programs, and at the apolitical stances of many of our institutions that contribute passively or actively to the oppression of Black and Brown communities.
In this session, participants will develop an understanding of power, privilege, and oppression and how they are manifested in their programs and interactions with their students while also unpacking their own fears and experiences in breakout groups. Participants will analyze their program structures and work collaboratively to develop strategies for making programmatic changes within their institutions to increase capacities to engage and serve the multiple identities of their young people.
Facilitators:
- Nick Martinez (Manager of Internships and Youth Community, American Museum of Natural History)
- Marissa Gamliel (Cultural Anthropology Educator, American Museum of Natural History)
- Tramia Jackson (Senior Coordinator, Science Research Mentoring Consortium, American Museum of Natural History)
- Kenya Townsend (Program Manager, Center for Excellence in Youth Education, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai)
- Andrea Motto (Manager of Public and Youth Engagement, Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History)
Track: Informal Education and Lifelong Learning
Target Audience: Universal (all audiences)
Topical Tags: Diversity and Equity; Social Justice; Inclusive Workforce Development
Preregistration required. Limited capacity. Fee: $15 per person.
Moving from Reactive to Proactive: Using Creativity Tools and Design-thinking Processes
Tuesday, October 13, 2020 – Wednesday, October 14, 2020
3:00 pm-5:00 pm ET (each day)
Coming up with new solutions takes more than Post-it notes and markers, especially when working remotely. This session will help participants strengthen their team’s capacity for creative, reflective problem-solving.
Full Description:
“If you give a good idea to a mediocre team, they will screw it up. If you give a mediocre idea to a brilliant team, they will either fix it or throw it away and come up with something better.” —Creativity, Inc.
How can we adapt processes designed to be done in-person—like brainstorming, Post-it notes, white boards, collaboration, teams—to work at a distance? This session will help participants strengthen their teams’ capacity for creative, reflective problem-solving, especially in the face of uncertainty.
Institutional upheaval can make creativity seem impossible just when we need it most. We’ve found that applying the tools of Design Thinking can bridge the gap from chaos to collective solutions. The session will focus on how to build the foundation for teams (and museums) to do this work: matching tools to your team based on members’ skills and relationships, and framing problems and objectives to generate broad, useful ideas.
We have reflected on the emphasis and impact of this session given current events. We will explicitly address the ways that working in a destabilized field and societies rocked by Covid-19, economic havoc, and reckoning with systemic racism make being creative more difficult and more vital. We will include a discussion on how these tools play a role in problems we’re facing, like figuring out how to re-open safely or re-framing core experiences to a new format. We will explore how the steps of Defining the Problem, Ideation, Planning/Converging, Prototyping/Trying It, and Reflection can also be applied to big, challenging questions of reassessing institutional policies.
Each presenter has broad experience using and adapting creativity and reflection tools with internal and external teams. Presenters will share case studies highlighting how they use particular tools with their teams, highlighting practical tips gleaned from their experiences. They will share successes and where the challenges lie in using each tool. Participants will practice framing problems and using a selection of lesser-known tools to generate potential solutions. This activity will be followed by a discussion of how the tool helped teams be creative, or how it may have fallen short, and how it felt to be part of the process using that tool. The discussion will emphasize the importance of matching tools to problems and building empathy for teams.
Coming up with new solutions takes more than Post-it notes and markers…especially when we aren’t in the same space to use the Post-its and markers.
Facilitators:
- Dana Schloss (Director of Exhibit Experiences, New York Hall of Science)
- Katherine Ziff (former Vice President of Content, TELUS Spark)
- Sherlock Terry (Director of Exhibits, Montshire Museum of Science)
- Prinda Wanakule (Director of Experience Development and Prototyping, The Tech Interactive)
- Elizabeth Fleming (Principal, Roto)
Track: Content and Design
Target Audience: Applied (familiar with a topic or mid-career professionals)
Topical Tags: Exhibit Design; Design Thinking; Future Planning
Preregistration required. Limited capacity. Fee: $15 per person.
ASTC’s Community Science Initiative: Workshop on models, attributes, and opportunities for expanding the work
Wednesday, October 14, 2020
11:00 am-2:00 pm ET
The session will engage participants in ASTC’s Community Science Initiative by sharing some of the insights from our ongoing landscape study of models and approaches to community in the science engagement field. This free pre-conference intensive is generously supported by the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative and the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation.
Full Description:
This free pre-conference intensive is generously supported by the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative and the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation. The session aims to engage ASTC members in ASTC’s Community Science Initiative by sharing some of the insights we are gaining from our ongoing landscape study of the science museum and science engagement field. The session will highlight some of the models we are exploring, including Dialogue and Deliberation models, and listening to additional member input on the barriers or gaps they need us to address in order to implement their own community science practices.
Facilitators:
- David Sittenfeld (Manager, Forums and National Collaborations, Museum of Science)
- Ivel Gontan (Community Science Fellow, ASTC)
Track: Content and Design
Target Audience: Applied (familiar with a topic or mid-career professionals)
Topical Tags: Community Impact; Diversity and Equity; Social Justice
Preregistration required. Limited capacity. Sponsored by the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative and the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation.
Saying “Yes, And” to Improve Agility and Responsiveness in a Disrupted World
Wednesday, October 14, 2020 – Thursday, October 15, 2020
11:00 am-1:00 pm ET (each day)
In science centers and museums, things don’t always go as planned. Learn improv techniques for fast and effective collaboration. (This isn’t a comedy class and there’s no pressure to be funny in front of the group!)
Full Description:
In today’s disrupted business world, where change happens on a daily basis, the ability to think on your feet is critical and, in science center and museum environments, things don’t always go as planned. Go behind the scenes and learn improv techniques for fast and effective collaboration used by comedic legends around the world.
In this half-day session, you’ll experience a highly interactive “crash course” in improvisation specifically customized for virtual ASTC attendees.
Whether you’re looking to build your leadership and professional development chops or enhance lifelong learning, you’ll gain confidence and build practical skills around agility, listening, thinking on your feet, and the power of using the “Yes, And” methodology when working with others.
The workshop will be presented in a fun, warm, and interactive virtual environment designed to draw parallels between improv tenets, common business challenges, and stories of collaboration from the world of space exploration.
(And all are welcome: although improvisation can lead to great comedy, this isn’t a comedy class, and there’s no final performance or pressure to be funny in front of the group!)
Presented by:
Sandy Marshall, Emmy-nominated producer/writer, speaks about the intersection of improvisation and business to F500 around North America. As an entrepreneur, he’s a partner at Norman Howard, having previously served as vice president at Second City Works (the business-to-business arm of the world-famous comedy institution), and has led client strategy for companies like Verizon, RBC, Morgan Stanley, GE, and Zappos.
Daniel W. Bateman, Public Programs Manager at Exploration Place. From a small museum of one employee to an international space museum, Daniel has appeared on national news and multiple media projects over his more than 20-year informal education career.
Facilitators:
- Daniel Bateman (Public Programs Manager, Exploration Place)
- Sandy Marshall (Producer and Writer; Partner, Norman Howard)
Track: Informal Education and Lifelong Learning
Target Audience: Universal (all audiences)
Topical Tags: Virtual Engagement; Public Programs; Talent Management
Preregistration required. Limited capacity. Fee: $15 per person.
Writing Competitive Proposals to Federal Agencies
Thursday, October 15, 2020
11:00 am-1:00 pm ET and 2:00-4:00 pm ET
Join this half-day workshop to learn how to prepare competitive proposals for U.S. Federal funding opportunities. Participants will engage with representatives from several Federal agencies.
Full Description:
Join this half-day workshop to learn how to prepare competitive proposals for U.S. Federal funding opportunities. Participants will engage with representatives from the National Science Foundation (NSF), National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Speakers will present: 1) funding programs and opportunities; 2) the proposal review process and merit review criteria; 3) characteristics of competitive proposals; and 4) common weaknesses of proposals. There will be small-group breakouts where participants will have focused interactions with the agencies and funding programs of their choice. The workshop is targeted toward those who have not yet been awarded a Federal grant, as well as anyone seeking to improve their proposal writing skills. Additional Federal agencies may be added at a later date.
Facilitators:
- Ellen McCallie and Bob Russell (Program Directors, Division of Research & Learning, Education & Human Resources Directorate, NSF)
- Tony Beck (Program Director, Division for Research Capacity Building, National Institute of General Medical Sciences, NIH)
- Helen Wechsler (Supervisory Grants Management Specialist, IMLS)
- John McLaughlin (Education Program Manager, Office of Education, NOAA)
- Melissa Ballard (Senior Manager of Public Policy and Advocacy, ASTC)
Track: Business Operations, Marketing, and Development
Target Audience: Applied (familiar with a topic or mid-career professionals)
Topical Tags: Business Development; Fundraising; Grant Writing
Preregistration required. Limited capacity. Fee: $15 per person.
Designing Convenings for Community Conversations and Action
Thursday, October 15, 2020
1:00-5:00 pm ET
As society grapples with three compounding crises—COVID-19, systemic racism, and climate change—museums must meaningfully engage with these topics in order to remain relevant in their communities.
Full Description:
As society grapples with three compounding crises—COVID-19, systemic racism, and climate change—museums must meaningfully engage with these topics in order to remain relevant in their communities. Convening and facilitating community conversations, for both in-person and virtual settings, is a mode of community engagement that pushes museums to relinquish their authority, assume a facilitator role, and provide a safe space for community members to connect with pressing topics. As trusted messengers in our communities, museums can effectively use convening models to dispel misinformation and allow community members to safely confront sensitive issues such as racism and white supremacy.
The Wild Center, a rural museum, pioneered several models that allow for self-directed action without crossing into advocacy, including a virtual climate change professional development program for teachers, a high school climate action program, and a green building conference for contractors. All of these are currently transitioning to a virtual format. Additionally, Science World, in Vancouver, Canada, is leading community conversations on the opioid crisis, acting as a convening hub that brings people together to learn from each other. With experts and partners in the recovery field, Science World facilitated conversations on important practices that aim to reduce harm, discuss myths around opioids, and increase acceptance of addiction, all topics that have direct implications for convening conversations around COVID-19.
In this half-day session, The Wild Center and Science World will lead an interactive workshop to guide participants through developing a convening relevant to their museum and community. Participants will be introduced to the fundamentals of online facilitation and are strongly recommended to attend in teams of 2–4 people from their institution. Accommodations will be made for single participants.
Multiple working sessions and breakout room collaborations are part of the workshop design so that participants complete the session with a convening outline that is customized for their community.
Facilitators:
- Stephanie Ratcliffe (Executive Director, The Wild Center)
Track: External Collaborations, Putting Community First, and Co-Creation
Target Audience: Applied (familiar with a topic or mid-career professionals)
Topical Tags: Adult Engagement
Preregistration required. Limited capacity. Fee: $15 per person.
Sustainable Futures: Science Centers and Community Partners Working Together for People and the Planet
Thursday, October 15, 2020 – Friday, October 16, 2020
3:00-5:00 pm ET (each day)
During this workshop, participants will gain a deeper understanding of sustainability science and practice, identify priorities for your organization and community, and develop a strategy and next steps.
Full Description:
This intensive preconference workshop will focus on creating and strengthening sustainability initiatives at science centers, with the ultimate goal of involving our communities in shaping the kind of future we want to live in. Sustainability is directly related to the 2020 conference theme because it focuses on addressing critical global challenges and creating equitable futures through science, governance, practice, education, and community engagement.
The workshop will be interactive, with a mix of presentations, structured conversation, and small group activities in breakout rooms. It is appropriate for professionals in a variety of roles at science centers and for those with a range of experience related to sustainability. The workshop will be adapted from a successful sustainability fellowship program led by Arizona State University in partnership with the NISE Network, which has over 200 participants (including one fully-virtual cohort in spring-summer 2020).
Presenters will share frameworks related to education for sustainability and sustainable development, as well as examples of successful projects at informal science education institutions. Presenters will also share research findings on how museum staff negotiate the politics of sustainability, including key enablers and barriers.
Through brainstorming, collaborative planning sessions with other participants, and feedback from presenters, participants will generate ideas that can form the basis of a sustainability-related initiative or a sustainability plan for their organization, including long term objectives and immediate actions.
To support their efforts after the workshop, participants will gain access to an online collection of sustainability resources. Participants will also learn about new opportunities to join in three additional fellowship cohorts that will begin in 2021.
Facilitators:
- Rae Ostman (Associate Research Professor, School for the Future of Innovation in Society, Arizona State University)
- Nicholas Weller (Postdoctoral Research Associate, School for the Future of Innovation in Society, Arizona State University)
- David Laubenthal (Creative Director, Oregon Museum of Science and Industry)
- Kari Wouk (Senior Manager of Educational Collaborations, North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences)
- David Gamez (Blue Crew Manager, Arizona Science Center)
- Ross Johnston (Virtual Learning Education Specialist, Mote Marine Laboratory and Aquarium)
Track: Leadership and Professional Development
Target Audience: Universal (all audiences)
Topical Tags: Sustainability; Future Planning
Preregistration required. Limited capacity. Fee: $15 per person.
Tools for Conversations on Equity and Broadening Participation in STEM
Friday, October 16, 2020
11:00 am-1:00 pm ET and 3:00-5:00 pm ET
Join this CAISE preconference intensive workshop to gain hands-on experience with a toolkit you can use to facilitate discussions with colleagues and staff on increasing equity and inclusion in your organization.
Full Description:
Equity in science learning and engagement is a major priority for many of us. Yet often our organizations have not centered equity in all of our efforts. This session is open to museum and science learning professionals who currently do broadening participation work, or who want to think through with colleagues the ways that your organizations—with programs, exhibits, or initiatives—can more deeply address issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion. Participants will gain hands-on experience with a free suite of tools (informalscience.org/broadening-perspectives) that includes: a report on Broadening Participation a conversation guide, a summary document on key issues to share with stakeholders, and 11 practice briefs. The Broadening Perspectives on Broadening Participation toolkit was developed during 2017–2019 by a task force (informalscience.org/bp-task-force) of 15 diverse informal STEM education researchers, practitioners, and science communicators, in collaboration with 13 key contributors from the field, and informed by discussions from a 2017 ASTC session led by CAISE Co-Principal Investigators. During the workshop, attendees will have opportunities to share tensions and challenges experienced at their organizations, read and share in small groups on deep issues concerning equity in informal STEM programming, and role-play scenarios with peers using practical strategies and reflection questions from the toolkit. This session is especially designed to align with and promote 2020 conference goals of networking and fostering new collaborations, sourcing ideas across sectors, and increasing community impact towards more equitable and inclusive programming and partnerships.
Facilitators:
- Jamie Bell (Project Director, Center for Advancement of Informal Science Education)
- Cecilia Garibay (Principal, Garibay Group)
- Rabiah Mayas (Vice President, Education, Museum of Science and Industry, Chicago)
Track: Leadership and Professional Development
Target Audience: Applied (familiar with a topic or mid-career professionals)
Topical Tags: Community Impact; Diversity and Equity; Social Justice
Preregistration required. Limited capacity. Fee: $15 per person.
Tools and Training for Starting a Successful Space and Earth Science Virtual Public Program
Friday, October 16, 2020
3:00-5:00 pm ET
Dig into free resources and training from NASA-funded informal education projects that will help you program virtual events and online engagement using space and Earth science materials.
Full Description:
This preconference session will bring together NASA-funded informal education projects with museum professionals looking to establish a space and Earth science public program online. Discover new ways to engage with your virtual audience on this important topic with no prior content experience.
Are you programming for a new virtual camp on the solar system and not sure where to start? Do you want to showcase interactive technology featuring space and Earth images on your website and social media? Does your museum need models or contacts to partner with subject matter experts for upcoming online events? All these needs and more can be met through the free resources and training participants will explore during this session.
The session will begin with rapid presentations from exemplar space and Earth science engagement projects before participants divide into breakout groups to brainstorm prototype virtual programming using the resources covered. The line-up includes: (1) using Explore Science: Earth and Space toolkit activities (NISE Network) for both asynchronous and synchronous online engagement through a museum education program; (2) adding ViewSpace or Eyes on Exoplanets (NASA’s Universe of Learning) to virtual events to present real NASA data to online audiences; (3) learning how to use informal education resources from the NASA Museum Alliance within new digital materials and how to connect online audiences with NASA content experts; and (4) driving the OpenSpace visualization software (American Museum of Natural History), letting virtual observers experience an immersive, interactive voyage to the Moon, Mars, or beyond.
Together, we’ll react to example outlines that knit together resources for virtual programming. Participants will review prototype plans, add modifications, and discuss emergent ideas in breakout groups that will be moderated by session leaders and additional colleagues. Groups will come together to summarize lessons learned at the end of the session. Follow-up conversations and questions will continue on the NASA Museum Alliance’s online Ryver platform after the session.
Facilitators:
- Darrell Porcello (Director of STEM Networks and Partnerships, Children’s Creativity Museum)
- Yesenia Perez (Informal Education Specialist II, Space Telescope Science Institute)
- Amelia Chapman (Education Program Specialist, NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory)
- Rosamond Kinzler (Senior Director, National Center for Science Literacy, Education, and Technology, American Museum of Natural History)
- Alexandra Jackson (Interim VP of Education & Director of Partnerships, Sciencenter)
Track: Informal Education and Lifelong Learning
Target Audience: Applied (familiar with a topic or mid-career professionals)
Topical Tags: Science Education; Public Programs; Visitor Experience
Preregistration required. Limited capacity. Fee: $15 per person.