Exploring workforce needs and intergenerational learning in informal STEM education

Informal STEM learning—a category of educational experiences that occur outside the classroom in places such as museums, science centers, and parks—has its own unique set of challenges when it comes to workforce issues and working with intergenerational audiences. It’s these issues that a National Academies committee recently sought to explore in information-gathering sessions last month.

The committee, which is actively seeking to develop policy, practice, and research recommendations to expand the reach and scope of informal STEM learning opportunities, recently held two public sessions on the topic. The first information-gathering session focused on the workforce that supports STEM learning in informal environments, and the second session explored learning design approaches when the audience is intergenerational. 

Each session was meant to examine what the informal STEM learning field looks like now and where it could grow in the future. Moderators of both sessions noted that the committee had not reached any conclusions, and the panelists’ views didn’t reflect those of the committee or the National Academies.

Video recordings of both sessions are available here.

The first session sought to understand the current makeup and needs of those who work in informal STEM learning situations, such as those working in museums, science centers, zoos, aquariums and participatory science settings.

Providing the participatory science perspective was Jennifer Shirk, executive director for the Association of Advancing Participatory Sciences (AAPS), who defined some of the workplace needs of those involved in participatory science and how those needs can affect the informal science learning that can happen.

Shirk found that the participatory science workforce has a notable early career segment. A review of those attending AAPS conferences over the years found that early career professionals were a growing segment of the conferences, although they are not a large or growing sector of AAPS’ membership overall. According to Shirk, this is significant because these professionals use participatory science as a way to deepen their scientific or educational pursuits.

Meanwhile, the types of roles represented in AAPS membership appear diverse, she continued. While conference registrants still heavily represent higher education and academic institutions, they also include those working in museums, national governmental organizations and other settings, she said. 

This workforce also includes disciplinary scientists, who may be the hardest to engage and yet can be highly influential, as they may influence the topics being investigated, prioritize what outcomes to reach and determine how to use funding, Shirk said. This is a segment that also needs encouragement to pursue participatory science, and that encouragement may need to come from the wider academic community, she continued.

“There needs to be a broader appreciation for the different ways that participatory sciences can play out,” Shirk said. “There needs to be appreciation by scientific societies and by review committees and by tenure committees for the work that it takes to make learning and relationship building a part of science and even how scientists can make a case for what’s necessary, particularly a case for the resources they need, either for professional development, for support staff, for partnerships, and so on.

Another characteristic of those engaged in participatory science is the need to work with and serve different segments of people, from non-scientists to colleagues to research peers and to funding sources, according to Shirk.

In this workforce, “identity really matters in terms of who gets involved and how they see themselves and [what] practices they need as part of the work,” Shirk said. Those who work in participatory science often wear many hats, including managing, facilitating projects, and evaluating projects as a primary researcher or a volunteer contributor, she said.

“The things that it takes to make a participatory science project thrive require so much multidimensionality, from identifying goals for both science and policy to managing data as well as managing the expectations,” Shirk continued. “Whether those expectations are the partners working together, or the volunteers, or the communities who are engaging in this, there is just so much that it takes for this work and these practices to succeed.” 

The second session looked at what intergenerational learning in STEM looks like across different communities and populations.

During the question-and-answer portion of the session, the panel was asked about the indicators of learning in each panelist’s intergenerational settings.

Scott Pattison, assistant director of research engagement science at Notre Dame’s Center for Broader Impacts and former co-director and co-founder of the Center for Equitable Family STEM Learning at TERC, said his team has been thinking about how patterns of interest develop within families, particularly holistic, long-term patterns that influence how children’s and adults’ minds shift when engaging with topics. 

“We’ve particularly been interested in… how the family is engaging together, the ways that different family members are influencing each other in that process, and how family routines and practices are changing over time,” Pattison said. “So, it becomes more of a holistic indicator of that outcome rather than, say, an individual child indicator that has different factors that might be shaping it.”

Nikki Berry, an assistant professor of environmental justice education in the Department of Education at UCLA who is also a citizen of the Shoshone-Bannock Tribes of Fort Hall, Idaho, in addition to being of Paiute and Irish descent, said that in indigenous outdoor education, she is also looking for relationships with the natural world. “So, in addition to the things that Scott was talking about in different ways of measuring learning, we’re also looking at how folks are interacting with the world around them, and [we] do that with interviews and also through analysis of video data of people’s actual interactions in place.”

Matt Kaplan, a professor of intergenerational programs and aging in the Department of Agriculture, Economics, Sociology and Education at Pennsylvania State University, said intergenerational dynamics can be affected by people’s willingness to let go of age-based stereotypes.

If a young person assumes that older people are “backward in technology, that they’re not going to figure this out, not only do you learn that you were wrong about them, you learn that you were wrong about yourself,” Kaplan said. “So, there’s an opening. There’s a lot of learning in communication science that we have to draw from to help people understand differences” and respect them across generations.

When asked what takeaway they have from their research and practice in intergenerational settings and STEM learning, the answers alluded to a posture of humility by both the STEM practitioners and the intergenerational participants.

“I think that it’s really important not to forget about the lands and waters and how they can be part of intergenerational spaces,” Barry said.

For Kaplan, the answer is reciprocity: “Go into the engagement with understanding that you have something to share and you have something to learn from one another. Because without that, you have people who can talk over the other person, and part of it is to understand where they’re coming from. So, [it’s] allowing people to share who they are, what they care about, how they see themselves—which is almost like therapy in and of itself—as opposed to letting the media define other people’s views of you.”

Pattison echoed Kaplan’s remarks, adding, “I think we’re still stuck as a field in trying to fix families rather than collaborating with them to develop a new vision of STEM learning. So, the key thing that I’ve taken away from this experience is shifting that mindset in myself and then bringing… that intellectual and cultural humility to the work with families so that we’re listening just as much as we’re teaching.”

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Joanna Marsh

Joanna Marsh is a freelance writer and journalist based in Washington, D.C. For The Civic Science Observer, she reports on new developments across the citizen science landscape, covering both new research and on-the-ground practice. Her work highlights how local communities are engaging with scientists to contribute to ongoing scientific research and lessons being learned by the involved stakeholders.