ASTC SCEnaRioS International Webcast
Tuesday, June 19
1:00-2:30 p.m. ET
Science center activities during the Rio+20 Earth Summit, which begins next week, will build on the successful Planet under Pressure (PuP) conference held in late March. ASTC and the other international science center networks will be involved in three major activities.
ASTC has been extremely active in bringing all science center networks together to make the case for our field and get us some visibility towards the participants at the Earth Summit. First, we have signed a common declaration describing the importance of informal science education and public engagement for the education of the public on issues discussed in Rio. Then we have organized the participation of the science center field as an outreach partner of the PuP conference in London, and finally, we have supported the efforts of the European network with the creation of a promotional film, using materials from many of our members that will be screened two times during the conference, once during the UN Day on June 16, and once during the science festival created by the Brazilian Ministry of Research and science center network. The film will also be part of a press package that will be disseminated in Rio thanks to our partnership with the Brazilian officials. (The film will credit all science center networks and acknowledge the Rio Declaration as well as the speech delivered by Austrian First Lady Margit Fischer during the PuP conference.)
Margit Fischer speech, Planet Under Pressure, London, UK, 29 March 2012
ASTC will have additional activities going on, such as the ASTC-ICSU cooperation on science communication, June 12 at 5:00 p.m. ET (6:00 p.m. Rio time), during which four short movies (produced by MIDE, Mexico, D.F.; Natural History Museum, London, United Kingdom; Questacon, Canberra, Australia; and the Science Museum of Minnesota, St. Paul) that demonstrate the capacity of science centers to explain complex science to the public and the importance of that effort for public engagement on the issue and participation in policy making processes will be shown.
Questacon, Canberra, Australia
Natural History Museum, London
Science Museum of Minnesota, St. Paul
MIDE, Mexico, D.F.
The final activity will be a SCEnaRioS international webcast on June 19, from 1:00–2:30 p.m. EST (2:00–3:30 p.m. Rio time). The webcast will feature commentary from the president of the Oswaldo Cruz (Fiocruz) Foundation and the director of the FEMSA Foundation, both of which provided support to the SCEnaRioS program, as well as Lidia Brito, UNESCO’s director of natural sciences and sustainability, and Walter Staveloz, ASTC’s director of international relations. Children who participated in SCEnaRioS programs will present their results, and there will be a discussion of what they learned from each other. The webcast will also feature live connections from MadaTech, Haifa, Israel; Miami Science Museum, Florida; MIDE; and Technomuses, Ottawa, ON, Canada.
Learn more about the SCEnaRioS program.
Download a flyer for the full schedule of the SCEnaRioS webcast.
Download a press release about the SCEnaRioS webcast.
For more information on any of these activities, or if you have questions about the Rio Summit, contact Walter Staveloz at wstaveloz@astc.org.