ISEN-ASTC-L is a service of the Association of Science-Technology Centers Incorporated, a worldwide network of science museums and related institutions. ***************************************************************************** Pardon my provincialism, but... One way to cope with many of the issues that lead to declining school numbers: spend more resources pushing your outreach program. Between bus costs, time spent booking the busses, time spent getting the field trip permission slips, time spent traveling on the busses, plus the cost per student of outreach vs in-house programs at the museum.... outreach starts looking pretty good. Not that I'm biased or anything. Jonah Cohen Outreach & Public Programs Manager The Children's Museum Chair, National Education Outreach Network "Burning garbage makes smoke, which floats up to the sky where it becomes stars." "That doesn't sound right, but I don't know enough about stars to dispute it." -----Original Message----- Hi all, Last spring we did some focus group research with teachers (a combination of loyal and lapsed customers) to try to understand factors that may be contributing to declining attendance from this important stakeholder group. Unfortunately, our findings showed that there were a number of things that contributed to teachers not getting out of the classroom as much (ie. no silver bullet - darn!), some of which are quite outside of our control (cost of buses). I know a general decline in attendance is being seen at other institutions, and maybe to science centres/museums as a whole. I'm interested in hearing from others regarding attendance trends from this particular market. Has anyone else done research to try to identify specific issues/reasons for the decline/potential opportunities? Has anyone introduced new programming or models of engagement that are seeing positive results re student numbers? Thanks in advance for your responses. Catherine ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Catherine Paisley Vice-President, Science Education Ontario Science Centre 416-696-3295 [log in to unmask] www.ontariosciencecentre.ca *********************************************************************** For information about the Association of Science-Technology Centers and the Informal Science Education Network please visit www.astc.org. Check out the latest case studies and reviews on ExhibitFiles at www.exhibitfiles.org. The ISEN-ASTC-L email list is powered by LISTSERVR software from L-Soft. To learn more, visit http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html. To remove your e-mail address from the ISEN-ASTC-L list, send the message SIGNOFF ISEN-ASTC-L in the BODY of a message to [log in to unmask]