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• Date of publication Jun 21, 2007 Category: Commentary

  Education, facilitation and inclusion - The tunisinian experience

  by Adel Zouaoui

  Being aware of the fact that science is a decisive factor for development and individual well being and a citizen's right, no less important than all his other rights, Tunisia's new-Era initiated its Science City on 10 April, 1992. The purpose of such an institution is to disseminate science throughout the whole of Tunisia for the different categories of citizens and to help, in the context of dovetailing with the educational sector, youngsters get, from their earliest years, interested in science and its use.

  Volume 6 • Issue 02 • 2007

• Date of publication Jun 21, 2007 Category: Commentary

  The role of science centres and museums in the dialogue between science and society

  by Paola Rodari , Matteo Merzagora

  In a meta-analysis carried out in 2002, the two main associations of science centres and museums (ASTC, mainly US-centered, and ECSITE, mainly European) gathered all studies analysing the impact of science centres and museums on their local communities1. Four types of impact were identified: personal, social, political and economical. It was noticed that the vast majority of studies concentrated on the personal impact (that is, learning outcome, visitor satisfaction, etc.), while the latter three were largely neglected. The very fact of pointing this out, and many recent experiences - some of which are included in this commentary - show that there is now a shift of attention.

  Science museums in a knowledge-based society

  by Pietro Greco

  The first kiss of science - From interactivity to dialogue

  by Juan Nepote

  Education, facilitation and inclusion - The tunisinian experience

  by Adel Zouaoui

  The science and society movement and the MUSE project

  by Michele Lanzinger

  The Lisbon post-its: how science-in-society issues were reflected in the last ECSITE meetings

  by Paola Rodari and Matteo Merzagora

  Volume 6 • Issue 02 • 2007

• Date of publication Jun 21, 2007 Category: Commentary

  The science and society movement and the MUSE project

  by Michele Lanzinger

  For the purpose of this article, Science & Society (S&S) is referred to as that current of thoughts and those cultural initiatives aimed at fostering dialogue between research, scientific and technical output on the one hand and society on the other, so as to allow people to make conscious decisions about science and the sustainability of its developments. This concept underlies the elaboration of the MUSE cultural concept, the new Science Museum in Trent, Northern Italy.

  Volume 6 • Issue 02 • 2007

• Date of publication Jun 21, 2007 Category: Commentary

  Science museums in a knowledge-based society

  by Pietro Greco

  What is the role of science museums nowadays? If we want to answer this question, we need to understand the historical period we are living and what role(s) museums can play. We are undoubtedly at the beginning of a new age based on a new relation between science and society, a concept which has been explained and repeated by sociologists and economists over and over again and is confirmed by statistics.

  Volume 6 • Issue 02 • 2007

• Date of publication Jun 21, 2007 Category: Commentary

  The first kiss of science - From interactivity to dialogue

  by Juan Nepote

  In the Rafael Nieto Auditorium of the National Autonomous University of San Luis Potosi Mexico, few chairs are empty. The room is full of Astrophysics professors, Solid State of Matter, Elementary Particles, Fluid Mechanics, etc. It is the 49th National Congress of Physic. Today ­extraordinarily- it has slip into the program an analysis round table about the new outlines in science museums in Mexico.

  Volume 6 • Issue 02 • 2007

• Date of publication Jun 21, 2007 Category: Article

  Museums for Science Education: can we make the difference? The case of the EST project

  by Maria Xanthoudaki , Brunella Tirelli , Patrizia Cerutti , Sara Calcagnini

  This paper addresses the role of museums in education in science and technology through the discussion of a specific project entitled EST “Educate in Science and Technology”. The Project puts together methodologies and activities through which museums can be used as resources for long-term project work. In-service training for teachers, work in class with learning kits or with materials brought in by a Science Van, and visits to the museum are planned and developed jointly by museum experts and teachers. The Project proposes a teaching and learning model which sees the museum experience as central and integral part of a teaching and learning process with more effective outcomes. The analysis of the Project activities and methodologies is based on the work carried out at the National Museum of Science and Technology Leonardo da Vinci, which perceives the learner (the visitor) at the heart of its educational methodologies and provision.

  Volume 6 • Issue 02 • 2007

• Date of publication Mar 21, 2007 Category: Commentary

  Boom and bust in popular science

  by Jon Turney

  The obvious thing to say about popular science publishing in the last twenty years is that there has been a lot of it! That is important in itself. But it also means it is hazardous to offer general comment. The British journalist and commentator Bryan Appleyard recently wrote in the Sunday Times that the “hard stuff” in science was no longer attracting so many readers. Books answering many small questions about the world, or evoking a sense of wonder, do better - he reckons - than those which offer large certainties based on a scientific, or scientistic view of the world. That type, Appleyard claims, dominated the field for years after Steven Hawking’s A Brief History of Time, with its promise of a theory of everything.

  Volume 6 • Issue 01 • 2007

• Date of publication Mar 21, 2007 Category: Letter

  The output for the Master’s degree in Science Communication at SISSA of Trieste

  by Donato Ramani , Nico Pitrelli

  What professional future awaits those who have attended a school in science communication? This has become an ever more urgent question, when you consider the proliferation of Masters and post-graduate courses that provide on different levels a training for science communicators in Europe and all over the world. In Italy, the International School for Advanced Studies of Trieste has been for fourteen years now the seat for a Master’s degree in Science Communication that has graduated over 170 students. This letter illustrates the results of a survey carried out in order to identify the job opportunities they have been offered and the role played in their career by their Master’s degree. Over 70% of the interviewees are now working in the field of science communication and they told us that the Master has played an important role in finding a job, thus highlighting the importance of this school as a training, cultural and professional centre.

  Volume 6 • Issue 01 • 2007

• Date of publication Mar 21, 2007 Category: Article

  Science and technology in a mediatized and democratized society

  by Pieter A. Maeseele

  We inhabit an age in which economic progress in the European Union is equalized to more European research and better communication of that European research to the public. In highly developed Western democracies this implies an important role for the public as well as the mass media, both actors in a transforming public sphere. Beyond a call for more communication and more scientific literacy, the discourse has shifted to a call for more engagement and more participation on behalf of the citizen. There is a widespread sentiment however that the discipline of science communication is at a crossroads. In this paper it is argued that in a context of life politics and an increasing displacement of politics, one has to account for the trajectories of issue formation and the detours of public-ization to understand the dynamics of techno-scientific issues.

  Volume 6 • Issue 01 • 2007

• Date of publication Mar 21, 2007 Category: Article

  Scientists and science communication: a Danish survey

  by Kristian Hvidtfelt Nielsen , Carsten R. Kjaer , Jørgen Dahlgaard

  This paper summarizes key findings from a web-based questionnaire survey among Danish scientists in the natural sciences and engineering science. In line with the Act on Universities of 2003 enforcing science communication as a university obligation next to research and teaching, the respondents take a keen interest in communicating science, especially through the news media. However, they also do have mixed feeling about the quality of science communication in the news. Moreover, a majority of the respondents would like to give higher priority to science communication. More than half reply that they are willing to allocate up to 2% of total research funding in Denmark to science communication. Further, the respondents indicate that they would welcome a wider variety of science communication initiatives aimed at many types of target groups. They do not see the news media as the one and only channel for current science communication.

  Volume 6 • Issue 01 • 2007