ISEN-ASTC-L is a service of the Association of Science-Technology Centers
Incorporated, a worldwide network of science museums and related institutions.
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It is good that you mentioned this topic as we are working on next
generation science center models including how they relate to the city and
environment they operate in. I do not know if there are any articles
that succinctly
summarizes the science center field - past, present, and predictions on the
future, but I can give my thoughts on where I think the field is going. One
thing I found of great interest at last year's ASTC conference in Ohio was
the number of science center executive directors, who I talked to, who said
they want to re-image the field. This is unprecedented as so many of them
in previous conference wouldn't have even consider this idea.

If you look at the history of science centers in the United States, it is a
curious timeline that goes from 19th century science museums that were
offshoots of the world's fairs and were repositories
of artifacts and celebrations of American ingenuity. That was till about
1964 when the Exploratorium and Ontario Science came out with the hands on
learning model which we have been using for the last 40 something
years. The advent of the internet, high-speed digital networks, demographic
changes, multiplayer real time 3D gaming, social media, changes in
the philanthropic environment, sustainability issues, and the rest of the
developments in the 21st are putting a lot of pressure on the current model.

The ontological shift for science centers is from being just a destination
in the city to being dynamically connected to the fabric of the city and
other institutions through networks. The purpose of connecting science
centers through these networks is to expand the traditional science
centers' audience, enhance their relevance and value in society, and create
new forms of engagement including being a participant in the evolving smart
cities model. This is one of our area of interest that is outside the realm
of doing projects.

Why this is particularly relevant for Kansas City is that we are in
discussions with the  Kansas City mayor office about creating KC as a
prototype for the 21st century city of the future. This would entail
developing a center for living labs, a center for data and media literacy,
street labs, games for social change, digital media and digital fabrication
labs, and finding ways to connect existing assets through a narrow cast
network using Google Fiber - an ultra high speed gigabit network currently
existing only in Kansas City. The science center there could be part of
this initiative.

A lot of our work in Kansas City came our of a lecture I gave there as a
keynote speaker at the AIA Kansas City Design Week where we talked about
Legible Cities. Legible Cities is a derivation of the smart cities model
which we came up with as we realized the importance of adding the messy,
organic, outside in process of innovation to the smart cities model to make
them learning cities, more innovative and more sustainable. Why this is
relevant to the new model of science centers is that science centers should
play a role as interpreters of our technologically accelerating world,  and
as content and program sources in the emerging communication channels of
Legible Cities. To get sense of the scale you can Google big data. Here is
the panel we did on this topic at the ECSITE science and technology centers
conference in Toulouse last year: http://unifiedfield.com/blog/?p=363

Some of the other people who are either thinking about and working on this
is Johnny Fraser from NewKnowledge.org, Tim Ritchie from the Tech Museum,
David Chesebrough from COSI (who has been developing next generation models
for years), and many others. Hope this is useful.


On Wed, May 8, 2013 at 11:47 AM, Jeff Rosenblatt <[log in to unmask]>wrote:

> ISEN-ASTC-L is a service of the Association of Science-Technology Centers
> Incorporated, a worldwide network of science museums and related
> institutions.
>
> *****************************************************************************
>
> Can anybody recommend a recent article/publication that succinctly
> summarizes the science center field - past, present, and predictions on the
> future?  And any thoughts out there on where you personally think the field
> is going concerning exhibits, programs, structure, leadership, relevance,
> role in society?
>
> All responses are already appreciated.
>
> --Jeff--
>
> Jeff Rosenblatt
> Director, Science City & Gottlieb Planetarium
> Kansas City's Science Center
>
> Union Station Kansas City, Inc.
> 30 W. Pershing Rd.  Suite 400
> Kansas City, MO  64108
> Office:  816-460-2218
> [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
>
>
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