Science Museum Of Minnesota

Programs: Exhibit exhibition, production, distribution & operations:expenses in this area cover the production, exhibition and distribution of science museum of minnesota-produced exhibits and the exhibition of traveling exhibits. These include science programs highlighting science, technology, engineering, & math (stem). The science museum produces traveling exhibitions that tour the nation and highlight stem initiatives. Total attendance for fiscal year ended 6/30/17 totaled 668,714.

education division:the science museum of minnesota's education division creates and delivers educational programs that increase the public's understanding of science, technology, engineering, and math and that serve to attract youth to science and science careers. Programs that serve k-12 school audiences include the following: school outreach delivers museum programs throughout minnesota and the surrounding states to both school and non-school audiences. Programs include science demonstrations and assemblies, weeklong science residencies, museum trunks, and an array of educational resources, products, and materials for the classroom. Teacher professional development programs including science content conferences, inquiry institutes/workshops, and science house, a teacher research center that provides hands on objects for loans to schools. The school services and school visits departments provide weeklong science residencies, science enrichment classes, pre and post field trip visit materials linking our exhibits with state science/math standards, and an online newsletter for science educators. The warner nature center which is an affiliated program of the museum provides school, adult, family, and youth audiences with a number of environmental education and environmental science activities and programs. Besides serving the k-12 school audiences, smm develops and conducts a broad array of educational programs for out of school audiences. The youth and family programs department offers science enrichment classes, workshops, special weekend events, and weeklong science camps for children (3-13) and families covering a broad, multi-disciplined array of stem content. Youth participated in these programs at the museum and multiple community sites away from the museum. The learning technologies center (ltc) is an applied educational research and development center organized to support informal science learning experiences through creative and meaningful applications of digital technologies. The ltc serves as a project funded incubator for developing new methods and web-based approaches for integrating digital and information technologies into exhibits and ongoing museum programs. Ltc provided a variety of camps, workshops, and programs for youth, adults and families. Another significant museum program is the kitty andersen youth science center (kaysc) which is an endowed center with a mission to empower youth to change our world through science. The program focusses on engaging youth from underserved communities age 6-25 on a coordinated pathway of volunteer and work opportunities in the museum and through community partnerships. Approximately 450 youth, working in teams or small groups, mentored by adult staff and volunteers, participate annually as learners, teachers, and leaders in stem. These teams impact more than 30,000 community members annually through their outreach. The kaysc's stem justice framework guides the learning and leadership development process which includes exploring identity, learning about the community, researching issues of equity, receiving stem workforce training, conducting community outreach and holding special museum events each year. In addition to guiding kaysc programming, the kaysc stem justice framework is used as a tool to train other informal educators in an approach to stem learning that redefines stem as a tool for addressing equity issues, engaging youth in a more culturally relevant stem learning experience. The adult computer education center (cec) provides software training to help our clients learn and maintain up-to-date computer skills. Cec impacts business professionals making them more efficient with software, workforce center clients by developing marketable job skills, and individuals through community/library outreach computer training making them employable. During fy17 129 different classes were offered for a total of 1,350 classes with 9,492 attendees.

science divisionanthropology:the science museum of minnesota's anthropology department has curatorial responsibilities for the museum's worldwide collections of archaeological and ethnographic artifacts. The anthropology department accessioned a variety of collections that enhance our holdings, cataloging thousands of specimens. Anthropology department staff conduct research to document and understand cultural change and diversity as well as relationships between people and with their environments. This year, department archaeologists conducted field research at sites in the st. Croix, mississippi, vermillion, and cannon river watersheds in minnesota. Collections research included exploring ancient plant use and documenting an unstudied collection from 13th century native villages in southeastern minnesota. We continue to germinate seeds of indigenous species of native american cultivated plants from the museum's permanent collection for research and outreach purposes. Educational opportunities were provided in the form of volunteer and internship opportunities, job shadows, informational interviews, lectures, lab, collections, and gallery tours, visible lab demonstrations, artifact identifications, and a college-level archaeological field school. Anthropology department staff regularly work closely with the exhibits division, contributing to exhibition content - this year to "we move and we stay and "sportsology" - and working with a broad group of community advisors and content specialists. Biology:the science museum of minnesota's biology department studies and shares the incredible diversity of life found on our planet. The museum's biology collection boasts over 170,000 specimens from around the globe including a number of rare or endangered species and the largest collection of mammals in minnesota. The biology staff (paid and volunteer) manages the collection and conducts biological research with a current focus on the biodiversity of wadena county in central minnesota. Communicating scientific research is as important as generating knowledge, therefore the biology department participates in multiple outreach activities. This year staff demonstrated specimen preparation in the museum gallery, hosted classes in the museum laboratory, welcomed museum visitors to the lab and collection storage area during special behind-the-scenes events and participated in public and school events about the environment in wadena county. Paleontology:the science museum of minnesota's paleontology department collects, preserves, exhibits and interprets paleontological materials including fossils, rocks and minerals from around the world with a primary geographic emphasis on north america. The collection is a rare example of a world-class collection primarily created by one curator over an extended and prolific tenure. During fy17 the department focused on documenting and reporting on the collection curated by recently retired fitzpatrick chair of paleontology, bruce erickson. A crew of volunteer fossil preparators continue to prepare fossils in the collection. Collections management and conservation: (collections services)the science museum of minnesota's collections services are responsible for the health, safety, and security of the museum's collections in storage, on exhibit, and on loan. Staff maintains, preserves, organizes and catalogs the collections. The planning of collections management continued to focus on digitization of the collections to make them more accessible to a broader audience. Collections staff gave numerous tours of lab facilities and collections to countless community, educational, and donor groups. Conservation staff performed treatment on and ongoing maintenance of collections and prepared artifacts for exhibit. Integrated pest management and environmental monitoring was continued for the entire museum. We continue to help with all aspects of the installing and taking down of our traveling exhibitions. St. Croix watershed research station:the museum's st. Croix watershed research station focuses on human impacts to aquatic resources, with an eye to inspire public support for informed policy to protect and preserve these resources worldwide. Many current local and statewide research projects (more than a dozen) are addressing the causes of lake eutrophication resulting in "harmful algal blooms" (habs) that often produce dangerous toxins. Because one cause of habs is nutrient-rich runoff from agriculture, the research station is using watershed models to test efficacy of best-management practices, including finding markets for alternative crops, that would reduce nutrient loads to lakes and rivers. Another cause of habs may be climate change and dust-fall, and so the research station is studying thermal structure and nutrient dynamics in lakes in isle royale national park, lake of the woods, and other remote wilderness lakes. The research station continues to be a leader in understanding the cycling and impacts of mercury in the environment, to monitor the water quality in the great lakes national parks, to be a key player in the diatoms of the u. S. (dotus) project, and to refine the use of radioisotopes in dating and fingerprinting sediments. Project funders include an array of local, state, and national agencies, as well as a few private foundations. Project results are presented in final reports to funding agencies, publications in peer-reviewed scientific journals, and presentations to policy makers and the public. Public outreach has been escalated during the past few years with a grant-funded science writer who has established a social media presence. Global change initiatives:the science museum of minnesota's global change initiatives develops exhibits, public programs,and stakeholder events on topics related to the challenges and opportunities of humanity as the dominant agent of global change. In particular, this department maintains and reports on the museum's energy and water consumption metrics so that they can inform and inspire the museum's progress and planning toward being a model of advanced building energy and water innovation; serves as the museum's public face on energy, water, climate change, and other environmental issues by preparing and providing presentation and perspectives to general public and professional audiences, both in person and through digital means; and represents the museum to environmentally oriented outside entities such as the board of district energy st. Paul, the university of minnesota's institute on the environment, and the minnesota climate adaptation partnership.

other program services include membership costs supporting the museum's member households, omnitheater operation and film distribution expenses for the museum's educational films. Other expenses include communications and marketing, depreciation, building maintenance and operation expenses.