Summer has arrived in the northern hemisphere, and ASTC members are offering a wealth of warm-weather science activities. Many museums held summer soltice celebrations on June 21, including Carnegie Science Center, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where visitors received free admission if they brought a snowball from this past winter to launch from a giant slingshot into the Ohio River. Science parks with water exhibits have reopened for the season at Heureka, Vantaa, Finland, and Montshire Museum of Science, Norwich, Vermont. And science camps are underway at many centers, including Oregon Museum of Science and Industry, Portland, which offers overnight camps throughout the northwest United States that invite both children and adults to explore coastal biology, astronomy, and geology.

Several science centers feature miniature golf courses with science themes. On June 20, New York Hall of Science, Queens, opened their new Rocket Park Mini Golf course, inviting visitors to explore space science concepts such as propulsion, gravity, escape velocity, and launch window as they putt their way through nine holes. Galaxy Golf at Sciencenter, Ithaca, New York, demonstrates a different math or science principle at each hole, and Science Museum of Minnesota’s EarthScapes course demonstrates how rivers, like the nearby Mississippi, transport sediment to the ocean.

About the image: New York Hall of Science’s new Rocket Park Mini Golf opened June 20. Image courtesy New York Hall of Science

On June 10, the Carnegie Corporation of New York—Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) Commission on Mathematics and Science Education kicked-off a national mobilization to achieve much higher levels of math and science learning with the release of its report, The Opportunity Equation: Transforming Mathematics and Science Education for Citizenship and the Global Economy. The report identifies where change is needed to transform math and science education and recommends concrete actions to a range of organizations from nonprofits and businesses to federal and state government, colleges and universities, and donors who must coalesce to “do school differently” to transform math and science education.

As part of the initiative, the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH), New York, published Emboldened Capacity: Science Education and the Infrastructure of Science-Rich Cultural Institutions, summarizing the outcomes of two meetings convened by AMNH in December 2008 in association with the Carnegie-IAS Commission: a “national summit on science education” and a follow-up meeting with leading museum directors and scientists. The paper also explores the role of museums in successful school partnerships and describes promising models at AMNH; Brooklyn Botanic Garden; the California Academy of Sciences, San Francisco; COSI, Columbus, Ohio; Museum of Science, Boston; North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences, Raleigh; and Pacific Science Center, Seattle.

About the image: As a partner in New York City’s Urban Advantage Middle School Science Initiative, the American Museum of Natural History showcased 650 students’ research projects on June 6. Photo courtesy AMNH

After three years of planning, Around the Americas, an ocean voyage organized by Pacific Science Center, Seattle, and Sailors for the Sea, is underway. On May 31, Ocean Watch, the project’s scientifically equipped sailboat, launched from Seattle to begin its 24,000-mile circumnavigation of the North and South American continents. During the 13-month journey, the boat will stop at 31 ports to draw attention to the changing condition of the oceans.

Pacific Science Center is staffing Ocean Watch with a teacher to lead outreach activities in each port and developing curricular materials on ocean health. Scientists also will be on board during various legs of the voyage. Planned research projects include the deployment of buoys in the Arctic to measure air pressure and sea surface temperatures, a survey of jellyfish populations along the route, and daily observations of cloud cover as part of the NASA Students’ Cloud Observations On-Line (S’COOL) project. People around the world can follow the expedition on the Around the Americas web site, which features daily crew reports, photographs, and a tracking program that updates the boat’s position every two hours.

About the image: Ocean Watch moored in Seattle before beginning its voyage. Photo courtesy Around the Americas

In January, Bonnie VanDorn, ASTC’s executive director for 27 years, announced her retirement, saying: “Since its founding in 1973, ASTC and its members have been instrumental in laying the foundation and advancing the capacity of science centers to engage millions of curious minds globally. The next great step forward for our association responds to changing needs and builds on this history of incredible success. Science centers as a collective force, through ASTC, are now primed to learn together, develop new partnerships, act together, and communicate their impact in ways that will make them even more relevant and significant in their communities.”

Bonnie will continue to lead ASTC through this year’s Annual Conference, and she looks forward to welcoming a new chief executive officer who shares her enthusiasm about ASTC’s new strategic direction.

ASTC’s search committee has selected DHR International to lead the search process. The job description is available here.

Photo by Wendy Hancock

Science centers regularly incorporate sustainable practices into their operations, educational programs, and exhibits. This week, the Science Museum of Virginia, Richmond, is planting a BayScapes Garden on its front lawn, making landscaping and maintenance a greener process while at the same time creating a new outdoor exhibit that visitors can explore.

The garden, developed in partnership with the Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay, covers one-seventh of an acre and will feature a crushed stone walking path and explanatory signs for visitors. The garden’s native plants were chosen to allow the museum to cut back on watering and their use of chemical pesticides and fertilizer and will not require mowing by gas-powered equipment. The plants also will reduce runoff into the nearby James River watershed that feeds the Chesapeake Bay.

About the image: Volunteers and staff plant the new BayScapes Garden. Photo courtesy Science Museum of Virginia