FYI,

The Informal Education Working Group of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate (SMD) Education and Public Outreach Forums released the results of a survey to better understand the professional development and material resources preferences of those who work in science/technology museums/centers, parks, public libraries, community/afterschool centers, and other organizations. This information was collected to inform NASA education and public outreach programs and resource development for the informal education community, but the findings are applicable beyond NASA. Please see below for information regarding our survey design and results. A significant portion of the 1,073 respondents were library staff!  For those of you who took part in the survey:  THANK YOU!

The survey results and recommendations are available for download at Informal Education Working Group National Survey of Educators - Results.

From the executive summary regarding the responses from public libraries:

·         Fifty percent offer STEM programming a few times per year.

·         The three types of STEM programs offered most often are scheduled classes/enrichment programs for children, afterschool programs/clubs, and public lectures by a subject/content matter expert.

·         The top three audience segments served by STEM programs offered by Public Libraries are 1) school groups in grades 3–5, 2) school groups in grades K–2, and 3) Pre–K groups.

·         The content areas addressed most often by STEM programs at Public Libraries are earth and space sciences, technology, and the applications of science.
The top three informal education resource needs are pre-assembled kits of lesson plans with all materials included, lesson plans for informal education activities with embedded assessment tools, and pre-produced text/images that an institution can print and display.

·         The largest group of respondents (37%) from Public Libraries said they do not plan to align their informal education resources to standards. Of those that do, they align or plan to align their informal education resources to the Common Core State Standards for English/Language Arts (27%), Common Core State Standards for Mathematics (25%), and their individual state standards (24%). Educators from these institutions prefer to attend professional development sessions in February, January, and March.

·         The conference that educators from these institutions attend that was identified most often is the American Library Association (ALA) annual conference (26%).

The results of a similar effort to understand the preferences of teachers are available at Survey: K-12 Survey on Teacher Professional Development.

Thank you!

Keliann

Keliann LaConte

Informal Education/Explore! Program Lead

Education and Public Outreach

Lunar and Planetary Institute

3600 Bay Area Boulevard

Houston, TX  77058-1113

(281) 486-2166

Forwarded by:

Sharon Rawlins, MLS

Youth Services Specialist for Lifelong Learning

NJ State Library

185 West State St.

P.O. Box 520

Trenton, NJ 08625-0520

...@njstatelib.org">sraw...@njstatelib.org

609-278-2640 ext. 116 - phone

609-278-2650 - fax