IN THIS ISSUE
July/August 2017
The science center and museum field tends to be very supportive and collaborative. There are many stories of individuals and institutions mentoring one another, passing along knowledge and resources, and helping the field as a whole to grow and move forward.
These mentoring relationships can be much more intricate than they might first appear. Mentoring relationships exist in many forms beyond the traditional one-on-one model. In addition, mentors often learn from the mentoring experience alongside their protégés, and sometimes a mentoring relationship can evolve into a mutual exchange. Protégés often decide to “pay it forward” and become a mentor to someone else.
In this issue of Dimensions, we examine mentoring in our field on both the individual and institutional levels. Contributors share their perspectives on how mentoring has brought out the best in museum professionals and led to the creation of new science centers, programs, and exhibits, sometimes in communities or nations that didn’t previously have such resources. This issue also presents research on how we might improve the mentoring process to retain talented employees and encourage them to grow.
Features
- The Mentor and the Protégé: What, Who, and How?, by Julie I. Johnson
- The Exploratorium’s Global Studios: Extending Our Reach Through Innovative Partnerships, by Paul Dancstep and Allyson Feeney
- Tackling a Whole-Museum Renovation After 35 Years, by Diane LaFollette
- The Magic of Mentoring for a Small Science Center, by Laddie Elwell
- Mentoring Relationships: Getting and Giving Inspiration, by Shirin Husseini
- STEM Education Mentoring Partnerships Between Israel and Ethiopia, by Ronen Mir, Mark Gelfand, and Alemayehu Abera
- Millennials: Are Science Centers and Museums Attracting and Retaining Them?, by Adrienne Barnett
Departments
- From the CEO—Inspiring science, by Gillian Thomas
- Inbox—Letter to the editor
- Spotlights—A science center rises from the ashes in Naples, Italy; a new museum opens in Miami; and more
- Notes from ASTC—Welcoming our new interim CEO, science centers on the global stage, two honors for Dimensions, and more
- Our Boards in Action—The Exploratorium’s George Cogan on the science of human perception
- What We Learned—Science Club’s secret sauce
- Special Section—2017 ASTC Annual Conference
- International Science Center and Science Museum Day
- People—Comings and goings
- Grants and Awards
- Q&A with the Field Museum’s Emily Graslie: Science, art, curiosity, and her YouTube channel The Brain Scoop