In partnership with UNESCO and ICOM, science centres worldwide are celebrating International Science Centre & Science Museum Day on 10 November. We are showcasing our field's contribution towards the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
Follow happenings on Twitter with the #ISCSMD hashtag and check out the map to locate events near you. Ecsite's Facebook page also takes you on a European tour of science engagement contributions to the SDGs throughout the day.
More than 300 science centers and science museums are participating in the global event, from more than 55 countries on six continents covering 20 time zones, all presenting a diverse range of special events, programmes, and exhibitions.
As the planet’s public science institutions, we are using this opportunity to recognise and support the critically important United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). While the SDGs are global in scope and impact, they will be fulfilled by the actions of individuals in communities throughout the world where so many science centers and museums are located.
Event in Paris
Anchoring the day: a high-level forum at UNESCO Headquarters in Paris, 9:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. local time, with experts from inside and outside the science center and science museum field discussing ways to address the SDGs in the future. Parts of the event are being streamed live here, including the official launch of the UNESCO’s World Science Day for Peace and Development, which is observed annually on November 10. Outcomes from the day’s discussions will be presented at the Science Centre World Summit 2017 in Tokyo.
Global experiment
During the Paris event, participants will see an animation of the Earth’s cloud coverage that is the direct result of a citizen-science project undertaken by science center and science museum visitors around the world last month. Photos they took of their local sky have been used by NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio to produce this look at our world, and the data collected by visitors can now be used to make valuable comparisons with satellite data in ongoing climate change research.