Russian cultural and educational institutions — either formal or informal — have a very poor tradition of involving children and teenagers in decision-making processes. Children’s opinion is at best ignored; while by default there would normally be no channel of communication between the decision-makers and those affected by the decisions. The Polytechnic museum — going through a major renovation since 2010 — has taken upon itself to empower children to affect what they study and how. I will give two examples of how that is brought about and of the difficulties we are facing. One is the practice we employ at Children’s University, where students, aged 7-12, formulate a question, around which every workshop is built pn a weekly basis. Another concerns planning of the future building and its particular children’s area — The Southern Courtyard. Here, we had put together three groups of randomly selected children and carried out a three-day workshop — all with the help with the help of a team of Danish architects, “All about A”. The goal was to develop both the philosophical notions and specific architectural solutions for a new museum area. The results of the workshop are currently being implemented by the Polytechnic team.