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Eco Boys and Girls & The Association of Children’s Museums & The Children’s Museum of New Hampshire Join In Celebrating ISCSMD 2017

By Sophia Collas and Maria Snyder

Eco Boys and Girls join with the Association of Science-Technology Centers to celebrate the 2017 International Science Center and Science Museum Day (ISCSMD 2017). As a children’s media company reaching young children across the globe with educational programming focused on early science, sustainable development, and respect for diversity through pluralism, being among leaders in science education and innovation is an exciting opportunity to learn from other dedicated professionals in this field.

Eco Boys and Girls has made it their mission to deliver high-quality, early learning in the areas where it is needed most for the future generation to succeed in our ever-connected, globalized world. Promoting early science, sustainable development, and pluralism are the Eco Boys and Girls’ main focus across all of their programming. To achieve this, the organization delivers research-based curricula, media assets and materials, and hands-on activities. Driven by five charismatic and colorful character—the Eco Boys and Girls—children are engaged in playful educational experiences through which they learn about their surroundings, taking care of the planet and each other. Eco Boys and Girls has ongoing programming with the Association of Children’s Museums, based in Washington, D.C., which engages pre- and primary-school age children in activity-based and self-driven learning about the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Through this program and in celebration of ISCSMD, young children are asked to think critically and curiously about the world around them and the role they play in making a positive difference. With the Children’s Museum of New Hampshire, U.S., Eco Boys and Girls Science Bites! Program leads children through science experiments that teach them about Science, Technology, Engineering, the Arts, and Mathematics (STEAM), and are joining ISCSMD 2017 with their programming at CMNH. Celebrating this important event, Eco Boys and Girls joins with other implementing organizations to share best practices and opportunities for collaborations with teachers committed to bringing innovative and forward-thinking education to young people around the world.

Eco Boys and Girls’ successes are in large part due to the high-quality materials and designs that capture children’s attention, but also because programs are designed to stimulate children in a number of ways. The engagement of children in practical, educational activities across their familiar environments—home, school and community—means that important and lasting effects will take hold. It is through the Eco Boys and Girls’ approach of child-friendly and relevant learning experiences that early childhood education can include science, sustainable development, and pluralism to prepare the youngest age group for the 21st Century.
By Sophia Collas and Maria Snyder

Sophia Collas is Eco Boys and Girls Director of International Education, specializing in early childhood development and teacher professional development in international contexts. Maria Snyder, Founder and CEO of Eco Boys and Girls, is an artist, activist, and social entrepreneur creating brands that combine social ethic and economic purpose.

The new, action-oriented exhibition One Planet at the Museon in The Hague shows that the great global issues facing mankind really can be solved. One Planet fulfils the Museon’s UN-approved role of pioneering and inciting action to achieve the United Nations’ 17 global Sustainable Development Goals. The exhibition showcases inspiring ways of ensuring the equitable distribution of food, water, and energy and the acceptance of human diversity. Members of the public are welcome to visit it to seek inspiration, contribute their ideas and proceed to action—making themselves heroes on our planet.

17 Goals for One Planet

The exhibition revolves around the United Nations’ 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which are designed to produce a secure, peaceful, just, and sustainable world. The United Nations has been prompted by the new exhibition to recognize the Museon as an official partner in publicizing the SDGs and their importance.

Thinking and Doing

One Planet offers visitors a series of seventeen displays, each examining a different SDG and together encompassing the major challenges facing humankind today. The interactive displays are presented in combination with items from the Museon’s multifaceted educational collection. The exhibition focuses on the many kinds of action that can be taken to guarantee the sustainability of life on Earth. From dramatic, large-scale solutions to modest ideas that impact on a single square metre, One Planet makes it clear to visitors that they have a part to play and inspires them to think further about the problems and how to help solve them.

Hero on Your Planet

Fortunately, there are people everywhere with enquiring minds and with the energy and determination to believe that something can be done to make the world a better place. They attempt, against all the odds, to solve vast problems like scarcity, poverty, war, and inequality. They are the true heroes of our planet. The Museon is gathering them together—both online and in publications and educational programs—to form Team One Planet. Heroes can present their ideas not only in the exhibition, but also in other areas of the museum, like the International Lounge and the Peace Cafe.

The Museon in the City of Peace and Justice

The Museon is a lively social hub in The Hague, the International City of Peace and Justice. As a museum with a go-ahead, inclusive image and approach, the Museon makes it part of its mission to bridge the gap between the international city on the one hand and “ordinary” citizens on the other. For that reason, its programming reflects the international character of the city and aims to help the general public understand The Hague’s global ambitions. This is immediately clear as soon as visitors enter the building and find themselves in the International Lounge. The area serves as a meeting place and links the Museon intellectually to The Hague’s International Zone and the themes of peace and justice. The lounge is a platform for trailblazing initiatives in the field of peace and justice, such as Hague Talks Youth.

By the Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University

In September of 2015 the Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University (ANS) had the opportunity to host a panel on climate change keynoted by economist and economic development expert Jeffrey Sachs. As part of his talk, Prof. Sachs discussed the pending passage of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

His description of the SDGs provided an inspiring element of hope in what is sometimes a depressing conversation. World social, economic, and environmental problems are vast, particularly when discussing climate change, but the idea of concerted effort by the world community to squarely face these problems—and set goals to address them—offers movement in the right direction.

At ANS we’re not formally working on SDGs, but the spirit of the goals is part of our institutional DNA. As one of the oldest natural history institutions in the western hemisphere, we are committed to high-level research and to scientific excellence. But we are also guided by two other key principles—active public engagement and positive human impact. Science is the centerpiece of our work, but our explicit goals include communicating, translating, and acting on science in ways that benefit humanity.

For the last 70 years, an important part of that science has been research and action to understand and protect streams, rivers, and watersheds. Water quality starts in nature, and we work to make sure that the ecology of waterways is doing its part to keep water clean. It’s obvious that Goal 6—ensuring “availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all”—resonates deeply with our advancing research, education, and public engagement in biodiversity and environmental science.

In Philadelphia, the front door of our city is the Delaware River. Though the Delaware Basin is smaller in area than the Chesapeake or the Great Lakes, the river provides drinking water for 15 million people—5% of the U.S. population.

Thirty years after the passage of the Clean Water Act, many of the nation’s streams and rivers remain impaired. While the CWA has been very successful in controlling industrial and wastewater discharges it has revealed a different and more insidious stress—“nonpoint source pollution.” Runoff across the landscape, from farms, lawns, city streets, and urban gutters, can carry as much pollution as a sewage plant, and it has proven much more difficult to control.

The Delaware is no exception. The 13,500-square-mile watershed of the Delaware is a mix of undisturbed woodlands, highly developed metropolitan areas, and large tracts of farmland. Limiting the effects of runoff on the Delaware is crucial for both society and nature.

For the last five years, ANS has been one of the lead partners in the Delaware River Watershed Initiative (DRWI). This is a multi-year, multi-dimensional, multi-million-dollar effort launched by the William Penn Foundation to protect and restore the watersheds of the Delaware.

In the last three years, William Penn has invested upwards of 40 million dollars in the work of over 50 partner organizations involved in a wide range of projects to protect the valuable forested headwaters and restore the sections of the basin that have been impaired by urban and agricultural runoff.

As the restoration and protection projects are planned and carried out, the Academy has had the opportunity to ensure the presence of sound science in all aspects of the DRWI. From identifying priority sites to monitoring the ecological results of the projects, the DRWI has provided a unique example of how science and community organizations can work together.

The DRWI is just one example of work by ANS that aligns with the SDGs. Through education, research, and public programs, ANS has been involved in issues identified as critical for people and the planet.

The DRWI has provided a unique and unprecedented level of involvement for ANS, both in terms of working with practitioners and in the breadth and scale of the activity. We think this is a cutting-edge trend that will become an expected role for science in the future as we deal with complex problems in human and natural systems.

From biodiversity and water quality to the overarching issue of climate change, ANS is working to engage the public around scientific questions and apply them to positive human impact. The SDGs will provide a context for future work in many of these areas.

By Crystal Harden, Director of Programs and Strategic Initiatives, Morehead Planetarium and Science Center, Chapel Hill, North Carolina

Goal 5: Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls

As far as not being equal was concerned, she said, “I didn’t have time for that. My dad taught us you are as good as anybody in this town, but you’re no better.”
—Katherine Johnson, “Katherine Johnson, the NASA Mathematician Who Advanced Human Rights with a Slide Rule and Pencil,” Vanity Fair, August 23, 2016, by Charles Bolden

When I read the article and this particular quote by the amazingly gifted Katherine Johnson, I immediately felt all kinds of emotions because I had heard that exact thing from my grandparents and parents while growing up in rural Wilson County, North Carolina. As a result, I have never doubted my abilities to achieve academically, and I developed a lifelong passion for education. Others may not have grown up hearing such words of encouragement, but now this book and this movie give them that opportunity.

When I first heard about a new movie starring Taraji P. Henson, called Hidden Figures, I was intrigued. I had to find out more details. Once I understood that the movie was based on a book about women computers, particularly African American women who worked for NASA, I wanted to know more and understand why I did not know this history. As I began to read about the author, Margot Shetterly, I learned about the connection between astronauts (all of whom received celestial navigation training at Morehead Planetarium) and Katherine Johnson. I also viewed the online talks and lectures of Margot Shetterly as she described the time period of the story, including the important work of Katherine Johnson and other women.

On a leap of faith, I emailed Ms. Shetterly and explained the history of Morehead Planetarium and its role in training NASA astronauts between 1959 and 1975. I was hopeful and persistent. It paid off! She replied with an intense interest in coming to Morehead to share the story of Hidden Figures. I can’t explain my excitement except to say, “over the moon.” The Morehead community and I cannot wait to hear what Ms. Shetterly experienced growing up in the Hampton, Virginia, area near Langley Air Force Base, as well as all of her research on the women who pioneered space trajectory calculations.

My colleagues at Morehead Planetarium and Science Center felt so strongly about telling this story to all our visitors that we designed an accompanying photo exhibit, Hidden History of Firsts in Flight. This new exhibit will highlight the first women in aviation and space flight, such as Bessie Coleman, Amelia Earhart, and Mae Jemison, along with the first human computers, Katherine Johnson, Mary Jackson, and North Carolina native Christine Darden.

The impact of these women stretches far beyond the missions and projects on which they worked. Because of them, young girls today can be empowered to write code and develop computer games.

We hope this story will open up new passions and dreams for more girls and young women to see themselves in the engineering and technology realms of research, development, exploration, and innovative design. Our goal and unwavering hope is that children, especially young girls and young women, believe that they are as good as anybody, just like Katherine Johnson did. We know that if they believe then they can and will achieve their highest potential.

By Elis Monroy
MIDE, Museo Interactivo de Economía

What’s the use of science museums? Surely there are hundreds of answers to this question, but if we investigate as children do, asking one “Why?” after another, it’s certain that sooner or later, the welfare of the people will be mentioned. And it is not surprising, since this has been one of the arguments by which science itself has earned the trust and financing to become the great “company” we know today.

Currently, there are hundreds of science museums of all sizes and themes, scattered all around the world. They respond to the growing evidence about the importance of creating spaces where people can meet and interact with scientific principles and mechanisms that explain some of the most important factors in our lives, such as health, communication, and food security, among many others. Gladly, we have seen that the appearance of these museums responds to the need of having the opportunity to develop tools to make responsible decisions at a personal and collective level, and this is where the importance of acting together manifests.

In the Interactive Museum of Economics (MIDE), the first in the world to specialize in the communication of this science, we realized that communicating the most basic principles of the economy without incorporating their relationship to society and the environment represented a weakness in our speech. Therefore, in 2011 we opened our room Sustainable Development: Economy, Society and Nature in which we show how our decisions regarding consumption and production of goods and services directly impact the well-being of the planet and society, as well as the many alternatives we have to rethink the role we play in these processes.

It is from this learning that we are convinced that science museums must help address a sustainable approach to communicating a more comprehensive and inclusive vision of the world we inhabit. Adopting this approach opens the possibility of glimpsing the challenges we face as a global community, of thinking about relevant solutions to the environmental problems we are experiencing, and of engaging with the decisions and actions required to build a more just and equitable world.

Last year, 175 United Nations member countries decided to join efforts again to address the most pressing needs of humanity, and created 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). These goals resemble the Millennium Development Goals, drafted in 2000, but also incorporate new challenges which address the quality of life of the population, the welfare of many ecosystems around the world, and the continuity of economic processes.

There are many ways of interpreting the rethinking of the goals, but certainly the most important concerns a second attempt to correct the course of our goals and decisions, encouraging more and more sectors of society to commit to joining efforts to achieve significant changes in the next 15 years.

The need to address the 17 SDGs from all possible trenches caused them to be written in such a way that they are easily communicable and inclusive. They relate to familiar issues such as food security, clean water, and the welfare of the oceans, issues in which science is clearly invested and about which awareness is critical.

Achieving these SDGs requires the joint effort of all sectors comprising society and, of course, centers and science museums. While each museum has a particular subject or approach, the transformational capacity by leveraging this diversity in a joint strategy represents an unprecedented potential, such as the one needed to give the necessary push to the SDGs.

Those who inhabit the world are in a moment similar to the one in which an athlete finds him or herself before a competition to determine who gets the gold medal in his or her last Olympics. They take their position, then align their mind, breath, and every one of their muscles to achieve the challenging target in front of them. Just like that, today we have to align our efforts to achieve a goal, rather, to achieve the 17 Sustainable Development Goals, to ensure not a gold medal, but a dignified survival in our planet.

Objetivos de desarrollo sostenible en los museos de ciencia

Por Elis Monroy García
MIDE, Museo Interactivo de Economía

¿Para qué sirven los museos de ciencias? Seguramente existen cientos de respuestas a esta pregunta; pero si investigáramos como lo hacen las niñas y los niños, preguntando un por qué tras otro, es seguro que en algún momento se mencionaría el bienestar de las personas. No debería sorprendernos, ya que éste ha sido uno de los argumentos por los cuales la ciencia misma ha merecido la confianza y el financiamiento para llegar a ser la enorme empresa que hoy conocemos.

Actualmente, existen cientos de museos de ciencia, de todos tamaños y temas, esparcidos por el mundo entero. Y es que cada vez se hace más evidente la importancia de crear espacios en donde la gente se pueda acercar a conocer e interactuar con los principios y mecanismos científicos que explican algunos de los factores más importantes de nuestras vidas, como la salud, la comunicación y la seguridad alimenticia, entre muchos otros. Con gusto, hemos visto que la aparición de estos museos responde a la necesidad de que las personas cuenten con la oportunidad de conocer herramientas para tomar decisiones responsables a nivel personal y colectivo; y es aquí en donde se manifiesta la importancia de actuar de manera conjunta.

En el Museo Interactivo de Economía (MIDE), el primero del mundo en especializarse en la divulgación de esta ciencia, nos dimos cuenta de que comunicar los principios más elementales de la economía, sin incorporar la relación que guardan con la sociedad y el medio ambiente, representaba una debilidad en nuestro discurso. Por lo tanto, en 2011 inauguramos nuestra sala Desarrollo Sustentable: Economía, Sociedad y Naturaleza, en la que mostramos cómo nuestras decisiones respecto al consumo y producción de bienes y servicios impactan directamente en el bienestar del planeta y de la sociedad, así como las numerosas alternativas que tenemos para replantear el papel que jugamos dentro de estos procesos.

A partir de este aprendizaje estamos convencidos de la importancia de que los museos de ciencia retomen el enfoque de sostenibilidad para comunicar una visión más completa e incluyente del mundo en el que vivimos. Adoptar este enfoque abre la posibilidad de vislumbrar los retos que enfrentamos como comunidad global, de pensar en soluciones pertinentes a los problemas ambientales que estamos viviendo y de comprometernos con las decisiones y acciones que se requieren para construir un mundo más justo y equitativo.

El año pasado, los 175 países integrantes de la ONU ratificaron su decisión de unificar esfuerzos para atender las necesidades más apremiantes de la humanidad, y se plantearon diecisiete Objetivos del Desarrollo Sostenible (ODS). Éstos retoman los Objetivos de Desarrollo del Milenio, redactados en el año 2000, pero también incorporan nuevos retos a los que se enfrentan los países, incluido el nuestro, y que comprometen la calidad de vida de la población, así como el bienestar de diversos ecosistemas alrededor del mundo y la continuidad de los procesos económicos.
Hay muchas formas de interpretar el replanteamiento de estos Objetivos; pero, sin duda, la más importante se refiere a un segundo intento para corregir el rumbo de nuestras metas y decisiones, promoviendo que cada vez más sectores de la sociedad se comprometan a sumar esfuerzos para lograr cambios significativos en los siguientes quince años.

La necesidad de que los diecisiete ODS sean atendidos desde todas las trincheras posibles hizo que fueran redactados de forma sencilla y clara. Se refieren a temas familiares, como las necesidades de atender la seguridad alimenticia, contar con agua limpia, o asegurar el bienestar de los océanos; temas en los que la ciencia está claramente inmiscuida y cuya concientización es fundamental para enfrentarlos.

Lograr estos ODS requiere del esfuerzo en conjunto de todos los sectores de la sociedad y, por supuesto, de los centros y museos de ciencia. Si bien cada museo cuenta con una aproximación o temática particular, la capacidad de transformación al aprovechar esta diversidad en una estrategia conjunta representa un potencial sin precedentes, tal como el que se necesita para dar el empuje necesario a los ODS.

Quienes habitamos el mundo nos encontramos en un momento parecido al de un atleta antes de la competencia que determina quién se lleva la medalla de oro de su última olimpiada. El atleta toma su posición, se prepara y entonces su mente, su respiración y cada uno de sus músculos se alinean ante el desafío que tiene enfrente. Así, hoy necesitamos alinear nuestros esfuerzos para lograr los 17 Objetivos del Desarrollo Sostenible y asegurar no una medalla de oro, sino una supervivencia digna en nuestro único planeta.