Collaborative Research: Grounding Institutional Partnerships in Structures for Broader Impacts Design

随着高等教育机构努力加强更广泛的影响(BI)工作，与非正式科学教育机构(ISE)(如科学中心、水族馆、动物园)的合作可以帮助它们加强其影响并接触到更广泛的受众。该项目建立在成功的公众门户网站(POP)框架的基础上，围绕让公众受众参与当前STEM研究的共同使命，汇集了高等学校和ISES的专业知识和资源。该项目旨在满足几个关键需求：(1)与侧重于学术界基础设施内的BI相比，公共外展BI活动相对不常见；(2)由于与ISES的合作经常与个别首席调查员(PI)联系在一起，围绕合作BI工作的做法建立知识体系的机会有限；(3)合作往往是短暂的，这使得大学更难在机构层面上利用特定的机构资产或战略，甚至将来自多个项目的调查人员联系起来。具体的研究领域是：a.开发和测试满足公众受众需求并满足NSF的BI标准的教育/外展BI体验设计结构：该项目将围绕活动设计过程(包括学习影响评估)创建可传播的工具。通过召集跨学科小组，该项目将确保经验将反映广泛的专门知识，并将有助于满足多个利益攸关方的需求。这些既定的结构将降低想要进行公共宣传的私人投资机构的进入门槛。设计、测试和研究长期、互惠互利的高等学校-ISE合作伙伴关系的结构：该项目将建立在经过验证的POP模式的基础上，围绕三个协作的HEI-ISE站点配对的机构伙伴关系的发展创建灵活、可传播的工具，考虑每个机构的资源、限制和战略目标，包括跨机构和跨学科的更广泛影响设计(BID)团队结构。持续的伙伴关系将支持公众持续参与当前的科学、技术和经济研究。与研究支持办公室的一名代表在高等学校建立合作伙伴关系：研究支持专业人员将是申办团队的核心部分，并将帮助支持机构战略，使BI活动与围绕社区参与的更广泛目标保持一致。项目合作伙伴包括与华盛顿大学博塞尔分校合作的太平洋科学中心；与威斯康星大学麦迪逊分校合作的威斯康星大学探索学院；与纽约州伊萨卡康奈尔大学合作的科学中心。此外，俄勒冈州立大学终身学习研究中心将监督该项目的研究方面。该项目的主要好处是为高等院校和ISE开发了更有效的协作机制，这将使他们能够更好地让他们的社区参与到关于当前STEM研究和创新的体验和对话中。该项目由推进非正式STEM学习(AISL)计划资助，该计划旨在促进对非正式环境中STEM学习的设计和开发的新方法和基于证据的理解。

As higher education institutions (HEIs) work to enhance Broader Impacts (BI) efforts, collaborations with informal science education institutions (ISEs) (e.g. science centers, aquaria, zoos) can help them strengthen their impact and reach broader audiences. This project builds on the successful Portal to the Public (PoP) framework, bringing together the expertise and resources of HEIs and ISEs around the shared mission of engaging public audiences in current STEM research. The project is designed to address several critical needs: (1) Public outreach BI activities are relatively uncommon compared to BI that is focused within the infrastructure of academia; (2) Because collaborations with ISEs are frequently tied to individual Principal Investigators (PIs), there is limited opportunity to build a body of knowledge around the practice of partnering for BI work; and (3) Collaborations are often transient, making it more difficult for universities to view BI on an institutional level in ways that leverage particular institutional assets or strategies and even link investigators from multiple projects.The specific areas of study are: a. Develop and test a structure for education/outreach BI experience design that addresses a public audience need and meets NSF's BI criterion: The project will create disseminatable tools around the activity design process (including evaluation of learning impacts). By convening cross-disciplinary teams, the project will ensure that experiences will reflect a wide range of expertise and will help meet the needs of multiple stakeholders. These established structures will lower the barrier to entry for PIs who want to do public outreach BI.b. Design, test, and study structures for long-term, mutually beneficial HEI-ISE partnerships: The project will build on the proven PoP model to create flexible, disseminatable tools around the development of institutional partnerships at three collaborating HEI-ISE site pairings that consider each institution's resources, constraints and strategic goals, including a cross-institutional and cross-disciplinary Broader Impacts Design (BID) Team structure. Sustained partnerships will support ongoing public engagement with current STEM research.c. Anchor the partnership at the HEI with a representative from an office of research support: Research support professionals will be a core part of the BID Team and will help support institutional strategies for aligning BI activities with broader goals around community engagement.d. Study the culture of HEI-ISE partnerships, building knowledge about how these institutions can form effective, sustained and mutually beneficial collaborations.Project partners include Pacific Science Center with the University of Washington, Bothell, WA; University of Wisconsin-Madison with the Wisconsin Institute for Discovery; and the Sciencenter with Cornell University, Ithaca, NY. In addition, the Center for Research in Lifelong Learning, Oregon State University will oversee the research aspects of the project. The project's primary benefit is the development of more effective mechanisms for HEIs and ISEs to collaborate, that will better enable them to engage their communities in experiences and conversations about current STEM research and innovation.This project is being funded by the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program, which seeks to advance new approaches to, and evidence-based understanding of, the design and development of STEM learning in informal environments.