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Introduction

The historic accomplishments of National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) science live large in the imaginations of individuals around the world: in 2023 alone, over 380 million fans and followers engaged with NASA’s ongoing scientific findings and technological advances through NASA’s 15 social media accounts. The NASA “brand” remains one of the most recognizable in the world, rivaling widely known corporate names such as Coca-Cola and Apple. NASA is known across the globe for its ambitious science, technology, and engineering goals: from space exploration to revolutionizing weather prediction to using satellite technology to help farmers plan for shifts in growing seasons, NASA’s list of accomplishments is unparalleled. These awe-inspiring achievements give the public a window into the possibilities presented through science, technology, and engineering. By and large, people share deep affection for NASA’s impressive moments of discovery and innovation.

To serve the public and respond to financial and sentimental investments in the agency, NASA continuously funds communication and education efforts designed to engage the public in learning about NASA science.¹ The Science Activation program (SciAct) is one such ongoing investment. SciAct, part of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, is a $50 million per year program tasked with funding education and engagement projects around the country. Since its inception in 2015, SciAct has successfully engaged diverse audiences in NASA science to enhance learning in science,

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¹ This sentence was changed after release of the report to better reflect NASA’s education goals.

technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) and to increase participants’ engagement with NASA’s work. In 2019, NASA commissioned a National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (National Academies) review of the SciAct portfolio,² which assessed the history, status, and vision of the program and its projects and provided recommendations for strengthening future work. In response to that report, SciAct considerably changed its structure and operation during its second cycle of funding, known colloquially as SciAct 2.0.³

SciAct is now nearing the end of its second five-year funding cycle and is poised to deepen its commitment to the nation by reflecting on recent successes and addressing persistent challenges. A few salient questions emerge: Is SciAct positioned to leverage the best evidence on education and learning to inform its programming? How can SciAct deepen its relationship with the communities it serves? Is SciAct reaching the right audiences, and which communities are currently underserved in SciAct 2.0?

To address these questions, NASA tasked the National Academies’ Board on Science Education (BOSE) with conducting a second review of the SciAct portfolio. In response to NASA’s request, BOSE convened the Committee to Assess Science Activation 2.0 (see Box 1-1 for the committee’s charge). The 10-member committee included individuals with expertise in Earth science, planetary science, collaborative models and partnerships, collective impact, education policy, community engagement, and learning and teaching in science and engineering (see Appendix B for biographical sketches). This report provides a comprehensive review of SciAct 2.0 and offers additional recommendations for improving the program.

THE COMMITTEE’S CHARGE AND APPROACH

A preliminary conversation with project sponsors helped to define the scope of the committee’s work. First, this assessment is not designed to evaluate the effectiveness or success of SciAct. Per the recommendations in the first National Academies’ report on this topic, NASA’s Science Activation Program: Achievements and Opportunities (NASEM, 2020; hereafter referred to as “the 2020 National Academies assessment”), SciAct hired a portfolio evaluator, whose ongoing role is to determine how well SciAct is meeting its stated objectives. The committee’s job was to consider

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² The committee uses the term “program” to signal an organized funding stream designed to meet specific goals. The term “portfolio” is used to describe the suite of individual projects funded by SciAct.

³ Throughout this report, SciAct 1.0 is used to refer to the first iteration of the program (2015–2020); SciAct 2.0 refers to changes made since the 2020 National Academies assessment (2021–2025); and SciAct 3.0 refers to future work to be undertaken following the current assessment.

whether SciAct is organized to effectively leverage current knowledge about supporting science engagement and learning in various contexts and the emerging insights from projects in the SciAct portfolio. In short, the committee was tasked with assessing SciAct’s structure and operation rather than its outcomes.

Furthermore, this report does not endorse or critique the individual efforts of the 37 SciAct projects but rather considers how SciAct can organize and support its projects to enhance the aggregate impact of the portfolio. As noted in the 2020 National Academies assessment, SciAct’s cooperative agreement process affords opportunities for funding of projects that have a clearly articulated, narrow focus but do not address every objective in the Cooperative Agreement Notice (see NASEM, 2020, Chapter 3). Through funding a diverse portfolio of projects, SciAct seeks to leverage the focused expertise of individual projects to yield a set of collective resources and opportunities that together respond to the needs of the education

community and of learners, are scientifically accurate, are grounded in current education research, and are deeply aligned with science and engineering practices. The current committee’s attempts to characterize overall trends in the portfolio are intended to identify gaps in SciAct’s approach related to the structure and operation of the program and are not meant as a critique of any individual project.

Lastly, the committee considered areas of interest highlighted in the charge “broadening participation of lifelong learners with NASA subject matter experts and authentic experiences.” Specific to NASA subject matter experts (SMEs), the committee continually revisited the question of how projects are leveraging SMEs throughout their work: our observations and recommendations on this topic are embedded throughout the report. Regarding the objective of “authentic experiences,” the committee engaged in several early conversations around the meaning of “authentic” and how projects could assess whether their work was providing learners with authentic opportunities to participate in science. We declined to specifically define “authentic” for each and every project in the portfolio, but as we will discuss in Chapter 4, we recognize that authentic experiences are often contingent on the extent to which learners can bring their own cultures, perspectives, and concerns into their participation. We discuss ways to deepen learners’ connections to science through community approaches to programming in Chapter 4.

EVIDENCE GATHERING AND SITE VISITS

The committee used several mechanisms for gathering information to inform this review. First, we held multiple open-session conversations with members of the SciAct portfolio, as well as with experts on various aspects of STEM education and engagement. In the first committee meeting, Kristen Erickson (Director, Science Engagement and Partnerships at NASA Science Mission Directorate) provided a comprehensive overview of SciAct’s history, its efforts to reorganize, and the status of the portfolio. Erickson was supported by Lin Chambers (SciAct Integration Manager, now SciAct Project Manager). In subsequent meetings, several SciAct awardees, as well as portfolio- and individual project-level evaluators shed light on their experiences (see Appendix A for a list of open-session presenters).

Second, several committee members attended the 2023 annual meeting of SciAct principal investigators, where we held a town hall-style event and small-group breakout sessions to gather the perspectives of meeting participants and to determine the type of guidance that would be most useful for SciAct 3.0. Committee members in attendance also had the opportunity to hold informal conversations with SciAct investigators and NASA staff.

Third, the committee conducted multiple site visits and observations of funded projects in the spring of 2024 as part of its evidence-gathering processes (see Appendix A for a list of projects visited). These site visits were invaluable for our work: each visit provided direct insight from project stakeholders on the successes and challenges faced in their work. Furthermore, site visits deepened our understanding of how well SciAct is positioned to support the diverse needs of its individual projects—findings that will be discussed throughout this report. Site visits were not included as part of the information gathering during the 2020 National Academies assessment.

Finally, in addition to evidence gathered through oral testimony, the committee reviewed documentation of program progress provided by SciAct, including SciAct’s 2020 and 2021 Research Opportunities in Space and Earth Sciences (ROSES)⁴ solicitations (see Chapter 2), annual reports for all 37 projects, SciAct’s 2022 and 2023 annual reporting documents, as well as materials furnished by SciAct’s portfolio-level evaluator, Pacific Research and Evaluation.

GOALS FOR THE REPORT

This report responds to a request from SciAct itself and serves to support the program in its aim to operate at its full potential and meet its stated goals, in the interest of maximizing U.S. taxpayers’ investment in NASA. The report serves three main purposes: (1) to assist SciAct leadership⁵ in making programmatic changes to improve program effectiveness; (2) to communicate the unique value of SciAct, both to NASA and to external audiences; and (3) to provide the field of science education with insight into a federally funded, collaborative model for supporting STEM education and engagement. SciAct has unique potential to leverage NASA’s considerable assets to meet the needs and concerns of STEM learners and communities around the country, and this report aims to support that effort. In reviewing the documentation of programmatic changes made following the 2020 National Academies assessment, the committee observed multiple improvements that can serve as learning opportunities for the broader science education community: of particular note is SciAct’s considerable investment in

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⁴ The ROSES solicitation tool is the primary mechanism through which NASA issues requests for proposals to support research and programming. The 2020 and 2021 SciAct ROSES calls can be found here: https://nspires.nasaprs.com/external/solicitations/summary!init.do?solId=%7B1FB5B0CC-E90C-F0A0-BC4C-6F8D9DD1A3EC%7D&path=open and https://nspires.nasaprs.com/external/solicitations/summary!init.do?solId=%7B70022F64-A0FD-0B3D-7FFA-FCC298C068E6%7D&path=open, respectively.

⁵ Throughout the report, “SciAct leadership” refers to the leadership and administrative staff employed by NASA to implement the SciAct portfolio.

supporting a robust learning community across funded projects. Thus, this report documenting SciAct’s progress can provide other federal agencies and funders with insights that could inform improvements of their own programs.

ORGANIZATION OF THE REPORT

Chapter 2 provides an overview of the historical and programmatic background of SciAct and offers insight into critical issues that have emerged or shifted in the STEM education landscape since the 2020 National Academies assessment. Chapter 3 discusses SciAct’s evolution since the 2020 National Academies assessment and characterizes the SciAct 2.0 portfolio. This appraisal sets the stage for the next two chapters: Chapter 4 provides a suite of considerations for SciAct leadership in their planning for SciAct 3.0, and Chapter 5 concludes the report with a set of recommendations for SciAct’s future.