EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

  Ecsite-uk is the networking body for UK science centres representing over 70 institutions. This submission is being tabled by Ecsite-uk to give a broad overview of the field and some key examples. Individual centres will be submitting more detailed evidence from their own perspectives.

  The UK has an energetic and committed science centre sector that is a world leader in the field, which has only come into existence in the last 20 years. While offering attractive interactive discovery opportunities for children they also provide a wide range of educational services and are important locations for discussion, dialogue and interaction with science professionals. They also make significant contributions to regional development and the social exclusion agenda and are very active in developing partnerships between themselves and with other cultural organisations.

  Despite periods of high capital investment, English science centres do not receive regular revenue support although some revenue support is now available to centres elsewhere in the UK. None the less UK science centres generate a higher percentage of their income themselves than the international average but are prevented from reaching their full potential by lack of access to long-term revenue support to make up the balance. There are several models that could be adopted to meet this need and with a financial outlay considerably smaller than that already provided to other cultural sectors.

1.  THE ROLE OF SCIENCE CENTRES IN PUBLIC ENGAGEMENT

1.1  Ecsite uk

  Ecsite-uk represents over 70 science centres, museums and discovery centres in the UK including many well known museums and cultural institutions with interactive elements. Its purpose is to raise the profile of science centres, and to establish their role as a forum for dialogue between science specialists and the public and as an informal learning resource for learners of all ages.

1.2  History

  Science centres are a recent phenomenon in the UK. The first to open permanently in the UK was George Green's Mill & Science Centre, Nottingham, in 1985. This coincided with the beginning of the hands-on science movement in the UK led by the "Launchpad" Gallery at London's Science Museum, and was closely followed by the Exploratory in Bristol and Techniquest in Cardiff, which both opened in 1986. This development followed the major flowering of science centres in North America such as the New York Hall of Science, The Ontario Science Center and the San Francisco Exploratorium, which opened in the late 1960s. This growth in US centres and their long-term sustainability was made possible by the US tax system's favourable support for individual and corporate philanthropy and the existence of recurring grants available from the National Science Foundation (NSF), neither of which are reflected in the UK environment.

1.3  Development

  Since the 1980s, over 40 centres, predicated on science themes and ideas, have opened in the UK. They are very popular, hugely varied in size, scope and visitation—Ecsite-uk member institutions vary in size from those with one staff member and less than 5,000 visitors a year to ones with over 750 staff and 2 million visitors, and offer an unparalleled learning experience at a time when science is becoming less attractive and less popular in schools. Some have a narrow focus; others, very broad; all have the capacity to draw the public into subject areas hitherto unexploited by museums and other cultural institutions. Many are the brainchildren of enthusiasts and explore areas of particular expertise; others offer discovery opportunities that enable family learning in a way that more traditional exhibitions and museums are only slowly getting to grips with.

  This ability to reach a wide public audience and engage their interest in science has become even more crucial over the last 10 years as science has become more topical and of immediate public interest. During this period the importance of developing a strong knowledge economy has also moved up the political agenda because of the need to respond to economic pressures from countries making major investment in science and technology, such as India and China. Science centres have played central roles, not only in developing the UK knowledge economy themselves, but also in developing other institutions that help the UK respond to these pressures, such as Science Cities, in which a number of centres are key partners, including Thinktank in Birmingham and The Centre for Life in Newcastle, and Science Learning Centres (SLCs), with whom many science centres work closely. At-Bristol also hosts an SLC. Currently, many UK science centres are also closely involved in bids to the Higher Education Funding Council to become Beacons for Public Engagement in partnership with universities in order to assist researchers to engage with the public in their research as well.

1.4  Central Capital Investment

  In the initial wave of centres, a number were developed by national or local authority museums (eg Launchpad at the Science Museum, Snibston Discovery Park in Leicestershire) that had national or local government revenue funding, but many, such as Science Projects' Discovery Dome (which led directly to the establishment of Inspire in Norwich and The Observatory in Sussex), Satrosphere in Aberdeen and others did not have revenue funding and have had to rely on one-off grants and other forms of short term support ever since.

  At the Millennium, the UK government singled out several major new science centre projects for capital investment, expanding the UK sector considerably. This was followed up with the one-off Rediscover initiative, a £33 million fund provided by the Millennium Commission, The Wellcome Trust and The Wolfson Foundation. Museums were allowed to compete for ReDiscover capital funds, but science centres are rarely able to compete for money allocated to museums, eg Renaissance in the Regions—and there has been very scant revenue support. In particular, faced with no secure revenue funding many of the major millennium projects have struggled to make ends meet since their inceptions five or more years ago. Some of these failed (The Earth Centre, Doncaster; The Big Idea, Irving) and others have had to make major retrenchments in order to survive. Only recently At-Bristol has had to close two of its three attractions and make 45 staff redundant. The great majority make an entrance charge for schools and for the general public. As a result of the dearth of base funding, Science Centres represent formidable value for money, are cheap to operate and get high leverage in capital investment.

  In summary, since the major capital injection at the Millennium, the funding from central government controlled sources has been in the form of three one-off initiatives.

—  ReDiscover—Three funding rounds in the period 2003-05 that provided £33 million in capital from the Millennium Commission in partnership with the Wellcome Trust and the Wolfson Foundation for one-off refurbishments of gallery spaces in museums and science centres.

—  Stabilisation Funding—£2 Million provided over three years to Millennium centres suffering from revenue difficulties to provide reactive support to stabilise their operations and allow them time to rationalise.

—  SCEAG—£1 Million provided by the OSI and DFES, channelled through Ecsite as one off revenue funding to support science outreach activities in 2007-08.

  These figures contrast with the £320 million that the DCMS provides to museums annually and the £400 million that the Arts Council provides to arts bodies each year, both mainly in the form of revenue support.

1.5  Partnerships

  Against this backdrop of high enthusiasm but scant funding, all science centres have formed partnerships in order to meet running costs, to sustain relevance and to compete with other cultural institutions that often receive national or regional funding. The partners include charities, businesses, universities and some local authorities. However, science centres are well and truly on the regional development "radar". For example Eureka! in Yorkshire and Thinktank in Birmingham have both made planning and development contributions to their respective Regional Development Agencies; the former in developing the regional "STEM" programme, the latter in leading the regional response to the government's Science Cities agenda, and there are many other examples of science centres making similar contributions.

  Science centres have also been active in creating international links, for example between 2002-04 Techniquest, with the support of the British Council established a link with Brazilian science centres and delivered a three programme of workshops aimed at capacity-building in this sector.

1.6  Impact and effectiveness

  In spite of their brief history, the impact and effectiveness of science centres is considerable. Many command visitor figures not achieved by museums or visitor attractions of greater longevity and firmer financial foundations and have demonstrated themselves to be highly financially effective when benchmarked against similar bodies worldwide.

  The 2007 survey of Ecsite-uk members revealed that in the 12 month period from April 2005 to March 2006 a total of 11,127,270 people made visits to a sample of 25 science centres, while a further 187,094 attended their science centre outreach activities. Of these 56% were female, which, at a time when there is widespread concern about a shortfall of women following careers in science and technology, is a strong indicator that science centres are one of the few places which are capable of developing and sustaining an interest in Science among women and girls.

  No science centre anywhere covers its operating costs purely from its science centre operations (although a number have ancillary businesses such as consultancy, conference and banqueting hire or car parks that allow them to break even) but science centres in the UK are bringing in 85% of their operating expenditure from earned income (including admission charges), as compared with 47.5% in the USA and 57% Europe-wide (Sourcebook of Science Centre Statistics 2005, ASTC, Ecsite and Ecsite-uk membership survey, 2005) making them among the world's most financially efficient. Where they have revenue difficulties, these arise due to the balance of funding, 15% or so of their total operating cost, not being available from a long-term external source, whereas in the US the 50%+ subsidy they require is covered by philanthropists and NSF grant funding. UK centres have been very effective at gaining funding from philanthropic individuals, companies and charitable trusts, however in this country these sources are also heavily skewed towards capital funding, rather than revenue, and there is no NSF equivalent.

1.7  Collaboration with Scientists

  Science centres have worked extensively with research scientists to help bring their science to the public in a variety of ways. For example:

—  National Space Centre provides live interview style presentations, virtual presentations using pre-recorded 3D shows, and panel discussions with space researchers aiming for current topics (eg a new/current space mission) or ones that are lively, such as debates over controversial topics. All exhibit development is done with advisors from the relevant academic and industry sectors.

—  Our Dynamic Earth presents contemporary science which is ongoing by scientists at the Royal Observatory Edinburgh. They also present current information collected and analysed by the British Geological Survey in Edinburgh (current seismic activity in Scotland and worldwide) and are collaborating with the British Antarctic Survey (revised Polar gallery focusing on work in the Polar regions on climate change). They work with the University of Edinburgh on the "Making Tremors" initiative; presenting contemporary research from the School of Geoscience and the Scottish Association for Marine Science to a family audience in Dynamic Earth galleries. They also have links with Napier University working with ecotourism students and with the wider scientific community in Science and Parliament Day.

—  Centre for Life provides on-site facilities for cutting edge research, hosting Newcastle University's Institute of Human Genetics and The North East Stem Cell Institute as well as other research organisations. They work extensively with staff from these and other institutions in "meet the scientist" events, such as Stem Cell Weekends, allowing users to meet researchers and explore their work with them. They also allow researchers to work on gallery to collect data for mass public experiments and carry out debate/dialogue activities with researchers as experts and facilitators, and have consulted extensively with research scientists in developing the new Our Origins and Our Future exhibitions and have a lecture series that brings a wide range of scientists into the public eye.

1.8  Dialogue

  Science centres are among the institutions which responded most effectively to The Third Report of the House of Lords Select Committee on Science and Technology 2000 (The Jenkin Report), which advocated greater dialogue on science with the public and have become major foci of dialogue activity. 25 surveyed Ecsite-uk member institutions ran more than 925 dialogue events in the year 2005-06. Examples of these include:

—  Inspire Discovery Centre is the venue for a monthly science café.

—  At the National Space Centre there are opportunities for public to engage with experts in controversial topics (eg the search for life on Mars), funding astronauts in the UK and other evolving topics.

—  Sensation in Dundee hold debates in collaboration with other research and science engagement organisations such as the BA and the MRC.

—  Centre for Life who offer mini-debates to schools and an array of public dialogue activities.

—  Techniquest runs a Citizens' Jury which looks at aspects of genetics,and also runs five Science Cafés across Wales.

—  ThinkTank hold evening talks by research scientists that aim to promote dialogue between the scientists and an adult audience.

2.  ATTRACTING YOUNG PEOPLE TO SCIENCE SUBJECTS AND SCIENTIFIC CAREERS

2.1  Impact

  Many people can remember a first visit to a museum or a science centre. The impact of the visit for almost everyone is pivotal—to the point where many can similarly remember the moment when they first became really engaged with a science or technological theme or activity. It is principally because of this impact that schools are so keen to visit science centres. The ostensible reason is the curriculum; however, the picture emerging from research (Winterbotham, N: 2005) is that teachers visit museums and science centres because of the profound attitude change that they engender with their young charges. Following the visit, attitudes change and stay changed. Suddenly science has found a context. It intrigues and generates change in the classroom and in the students outlook. Other research (McManus, P: passim) demonstrates the considerable learning impact of the family visit.

  Impact studies have shown that science centres can make a significant difference to the interest in and understanding of science by their visitors. Visitors interrogated at the end of their visits, or even 6 months after, can recall significant moments and the meaning of many of the exhibits they used and interactions they had with floor staff. A frequent comment is that if they would have been exposed to such a question driven and exploration focused experience before, when at school, they would have embraced science with interest. The measurement of impact does show that a prepared visit (through the website, pre-briefing or reading questionnaires) leads to an even more significant outcome.

2.2  Learning

  "Learning is a process of active engagement with experience. It is what people do when they want to make sense of the world. It may involve the development or deepening of skills, knowledge, understanding, awareness, values, ideas and feelings, or an increase in the capacity to reflect. Effective learning leads to change, development and the desire to learn more". (Adapted from Campaign for Learning).

  Museums, libraries and archives use the quote above when asserting that learning is central to their purpose. It is no less applicable to science centres, particularly as they actually do give users active engagement with real, physical, scientific phenomena and give them the freedom to explore them to make sense of the world. Many teachers share the belief that science learning should be an entitlement, and while Health and Safety guidelines have made it increasingly difficult to engage children with science experimentation, science centres offer this as stock in trade. Science centres now do what the school classroom cannot. There was an erroneous perception when science centres were first delivered that they were mere entertainment centres for children with no appreciable learning content. Now, the breadth and quality of science centres is such that no such illusion can persist.

  All science centres offer some kind of resources for learning, including classes, demonstrations, school field trips, outreach programmes, teacher training activities, and even camp ins, science kits for schools, after school programmes, study support activities, programmes for home-schooled children and youth employment placements and some offer extremely extensive programmes. For example, The Centre for Life in Newcastle can offer schools 60 different taught lab programmes from simple science for primary schools to advanced genetics for sixth-formers using professional equipment beyond school budgets, and also teach a unit on a genetics MSc course for Newcastle University. Science centres have also been quick to adopt the Generic Learning Outcomes (GLOs) developed for museums as part of their Learning for All strategy, as these criteria are equally, if not more suited to the learning activities in science centres as those in museums.

2.3  Regional impact

  Science centres operate very closely within their regional and local contexts—79% of the UK population is within an hour's drive of one or more science centre. Many centres are highly socially inclusive and respond to local needs and problems, contributing local solutions to issues otherwise unattended to. Several of the Millennium projects have a high level of engagement with housing and regeneration schemes and are currently engaged with economic development in urban contexts. Inspire in Norwich contributes to the upkeep of an otherwise redundant medieval church and its establishment in a run-down area of the city was an important driver for the district's social regeneration; At-Bristol is a major contributor to the economic regeneration of the Bristol Docks; in Scotland and in Wales the major science centres—one in Wales and four in Scotland—have been adopted and funded as major contributors to the cultural and learning mix of the major cities.

3.  THE FUNDING AVAILABLE TO SUCH CENTRES FROM CENTRAL GOVERNMENT

  3.1  Science centres are nationally well integrated, with Ecsite-uk speaking for all the science centres and co-ordinating their efforts in advocacy and combination funding. They have an extensive track record of collaboration, both between themselves, but also with other organisations nationally and internationally.

  3.2  There is a paradigm for enlightened and effective central funding of Science Centres in Wales and Scotland:

—  In Scotland the total funding made available to their four science centres is approximately £3.6 million a year. This currently includes deficit filling, capital and education related programming and the administrative costs of the civil servant team managing the process. Revenue funds are approved on the basis of business plan and budget and key outputs such as delivering against visitor number targets, school visits, education activities—this represents the core funding that each centre gets. There is typically a discretionary spend remaining and this is bid for by each centre. Centres are required to report quarterly and release of that quarter's funding is subject to approval of these reports.

—  In Wales, Techniquest receives approximately £1 million a year and reports to the Welsh Assembly against a series of performance indicators in order to qualify for this. The funding is for a contribution towards management, administration and HR costs, development and research, Building and infrastructure repair and maintenance, Educational programmes support, Exhibition refreshment (essential upgrades and improvements—not major renewals) and the Summer Theme events.

—  In Northern Ireland, W5 received a mix of revenue and capital funding from the Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure (DCAL). This funding ceased at the end of 2006-07. W5 is currently negotiating with DCAL and his moving away from a deficit funding model to that of a service delivery agreement meeting specific objectives and agreed outputs.

  3.3  Excluding lottery capital, there have only been two fragmented ad hoc short term initiatives in England. There is no initiative in place to strategically support the centres as there is in the rest of the UK. Nor is there a National Science Foundation (NSF) as in the USA which distributes grants on a regular basis following competition and peer review. This method encourages efficiency and innovation while ensuring the health and stability of the sector and has proved effective over many years.

4.  CONCLUSION

  4.1  UK science centres provide stimulating experiences for learners of all ages. They are very effective at using interactive exhibits to engage and familiarise children with science from even a young age, but this is just one aspect of their activity. They also:

—  Provide a neutral forum for users of all ages to engage with fast moving developments in science and technology through dialogue and interaction with practicing scientists.

—  Support schools with a wide range of high quality educational activities both on site and as outreach activities.

—  Work in partnership with other science centres in the UK and internationally.

—  Collaborate with a huge spectrum of other social and cultural groups.

—  Are strongly rooted in their local context.

—  Act as important drivers for regeneration and social inclusion.

  4.2  Science centres do not seek the right to an annual stipend. They are capable of demonstrating clear outcomes and impacts in return for any funding. The future health and impact of this important cultural sector can be assured by the provision of a systematic method of providing long-term revenue and capital support comparable to that provided to other cultural sectors, such as museums and the arts, but at a fraction of the cost.

June 2007