Science Museum Curator

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00:00:15.14 Hi, my name is Jennifer Frazier and I'm an associate curator
00:00:19.21 at the Exploratorium, a science museum in San Francisco, California.
00:00:24.01 Today I'm going to talk about why I think science museums
00:00:27.11 are important and how I went from designing experiments at UCSF
00:00:31.14 to designing museum exhibitions.
00:00:34.27 I have my friend T. rex here not because we have a T. rex at the Exploratorium,
00:00:39.24 but because I think it sort of symbolizes what's really special about museums.
00:00:46.05 In a science museum you can stand under a fossilized T. rex skeleton.
00:00:49.29 You can be transported to another galaxy in a planetarium show.
00:00:54.21 Maybe you can peer into a developing, live zebra fish embryo.
00:00:59.28 The bottom line is that a museum, a science museum, can be
00:01:03.24 a place where you can really have experiences you can't have anywhere else
00:01:07.24 of the natural world and of science.
00:01:10.23 But science museums are not just sort of point places
00:01:13.28 where you can go with your grandparents to look at fossils.
00:01:17.01 They're actually, I think, a very critical place
00:01:19.21 for science education and science communication.
00:01:22.27 This is a picture of the Exploratorium on sort of a typical day.
00:01:26.10 There are a lot of people there.
00:01:27.28 And there are actually 50 million people a year in the United States alone
00:01:32.06 going to science museums.
00:01:33.28 So it's not just sort of a place to kill a Sunday afternoon.
00:01:37.29 They're actually venues where a lot of people go for science information
00:01:41.21 and science experiences with their families, classes, first dates.
00:01:47.00 That provides us with a real opportunity.
00:01:49.02 If you think about it, a lot of people have science in school
00:01:52.08 elementary, high school aged kids, even college students,
00:01:55.05 but where can a 40 year old look at their cheek cells under a microscope?
00:01:59.21 Or where can a retiree participate in a forum on the risks and benefits of nanotechnology?
00:02:05.06 Science museums are a place where people who are no longer in school
00:02:09.01 can actually really have a science experience.
00:02:11.07 They can touch things, see things and explore things that they can't do at home.
00:02:17.01 The Exploratorium, where I work, is near and dear to my heart because of its philosophy.
00:02:22.24 The Exploratorium is not about just presenting facts or science content.
00:02:28.04 It's not just something static where you can read a label.
00:02:31.15 It was actually designed initially by a scientist named Frank Oppenheimer
00:02:35.17 as a place for people to observe scientific phenomena,
00:02:39.20 make their own predictions, test hypotheses.
00:02:42.21 It was really about creating an environment where people could explore
00:02:45.28 much in the way a scientist would.
00:02:47.16 So instead of telling you what to think,
00:02:48.28 you're actually getting to explore your own environment.
00:02:52.21 It's really set up to do that.
00:02:55.03 The reason this is really meaningful to me is that
00:02:57.28 after I started working at the Exploratorium, I looked back on a lot of the experiences I had as a kid.
00:03:02.16 So here I am in a nice 80's Polaroid. I'm not sure how old I am here, maybe like 9 or 10.
00:03:07.23 But after I started working in a science museum and
00:03:11.01 thinking about how much childhood experiences or later experiences
00:03:15.14 can affect someone's thoughts about science, I looked back on my own past
00:03:19.24 and I realized that I never really got very excited about science in school.
00:03:24.09 It was textbooks, maybe a cookie cutter lab.
00:03:28.04 And it was only things like science fairs where, you know,
00:03:30.17 my mom, who actually was a science teacher, would say,
00:03:33.18 "OK, so what do you want to know? What are you interested in?"
00:03:36.04 I guess at whatever age this is I was interested in plants
00:03:39.19 and what plants need to grow, but I got to ask the question,
00:03:42.28 and she helped me get the materials to develop my own experiments.
00:03:47.14 And that was something that really sustained me and got me excited about science.
00:03:50.22 Likewise, in high school, I had a teacher,
00:03:54.05 and I'm guessing what he did may now be illegal, but
00:03:57.00 he would provide us with these sort of flammable sludges,
00:04:00.21 and we would decant them and fractionate them,
00:04:03.04 and there were all sorts of Bunsen burners and things involved
00:04:06.13 and many eyebrows and eyelashes lost along the way,
00:04:09.20 but again, just when my interest in science started dipping,
00:04:12.14 I got into Mr. Schermyer's class and lit my eyebrows on fire and I was hooked on science again.
00:04:17.25 And then in college, again, I was science major
00:04:21.06 and started losing interest through the O. Chem. lectures
00:04:24.05 and started working with Scott Hawley who's now a professor at the Stowers Institute.
00:04:30.15 And he said, "Hey, you seem pretty interested in science. Do you want to come work in my research lab?"
00:04:35.07 And I thought, "Eh, I don't know. Labs don't seem that interesting."
00:04:40.17 But it was only by working in a real research lab, getting to ask my own questions
00:04:44.17 and pursue my interests that made me really excited about science.
00:04:49.11 So to me, science museums it's...
00:04:52.19 I'm not thinking that in the two minutes someone's in using one of my exhibits
00:04:56.27 is ever going to replace a parent, a high school teacher, or a professor who
00:05:01.25 really engages with someone, but if there's any chance
00:05:04.25 that someone who thinks that science is just a textbook
00:05:07.26 can come to the Exploratorium and begin to associate science with
00:05:11.28 curiosity, fun, exploration, that would mean a lot to me.
00:05:18.22 So that's one of the reasons that I find my job very meaningful.
00:05:21.03 But, how did I go from Yolo county, 1982 science fair award winner
00:05:28.24 to a museum curator by way of UCSF for my graduate training?
00:05:34.07 Well, I didn't actually ever think about working in a science museum.
00:05:38.00 This picture is a sketch from one of my first science museum jobs.
00:05:44.10 I had finished my Ph.D. and had done some work both in documentary film
00:05:48.20 and in educational game design all around science.
00:05:52.08 But had never thought that working in a science museum was really a job.
00:05:55.08 I mean I loved science museums.
00:05:57.00 I'd gone to science museums as much as I could as a kid.
00:06:00.10 But I never thought, "Oh, wow! Somebody must assemble this T. rex skeleton!"
00:06:03.21 or "I wonder who put this zebrafish embryo on the slide and made a label?"
00:06:08.25 It just never occurred to me that there were careers in that.
00:06:11.12 And one day I got a call from Bruce Alberts, one of my mentors from graduate school.
00:06:16.04 And he said, "The National Academy is starting a museum
00:06:19.24 called the Koshland Science Museum.
00:06:21.07 Do you want to use some of your background to help us with the museum?"
00:06:24.25 And this sketch, I don't actually even think any of these things were ever built,
00:06:28.10 this was one of the sketches that a designer at the time made
00:06:31.15 when we were working on the project.
00:06:33.02 And it was about, as you can guess from the spiral in the background,
00:06:36.10 it was about genetic technologies.
00:06:39.07 But, this was really a transformative experience for me
00:06:43.00 because working on this museum project was like,
00:06:46.20 "Oh, wow!" I'm getting to work with leading researchers.
00:06:49.21 I'm thinking about cutting edge science.
00:06:51.11 I'm thinking about how to translate this science in an interesting way
00:06:54.08 for the public. I'm working with computer programmers, artists.
00:06:57.19 I'm working with environmental designers to think through the space and
00:07:00.24 how it's affecting how people are learning.
00:07:03.14 I'm working with educational researchers.
00:07:05.28 I found there was a whole field of people who study how people learn
00:07:09.06 and how to create effective learning experiences.
00:07:11.19 And for someone like me who had always really liked film and writing,
00:07:15.11 and architecture and anthropology, in addition to science, I felt like I'd really found sort of
00:07:20.23 my dream job where I could not only think about science but a lot of other things that
00:07:26.08 were really meaningful and fun and interesting.
00:07:28.22 So that was my sort of first experience with museums
00:07:31.27 and for the last seven years I've been at the Exploratorium,
00:07:34.00 and I've worked on a number of different projects
00:07:36.14 that kind of give you a snapshot of the kinds of work that you can do
00:07:40.01 when you're a scientist in a museum.
00:07:41.17 This was the microscope imaging station. It's still on the floor of the Exploratorium,
00:07:46.14 and it's a place where visitors can go and use real research grade microscopes
00:07:51.10 to look at live model organisms. And I got to help
00:07:55.17 pick the organisms and work with researchers on the stories about these organisms
00:08:00.01 and help the public understand why we study zebrafish or amoeba
00:08:04.27 or C. elegans and that was a lot of fun.
00:08:08.02 I got to work with a lot of my old colleagues at UCSF.
00:08:11.07 I also spent a few years on a project about nanoscale science
00:08:15.08 This is a piece where we worked with an artist named Scott Snibbe
00:08:18.07 in San Francisco where visitors could interact with water molecules with their shadows.
00:08:22.23 And this was another really interesting project where it was about:
00:08:26.08 how do we represent things we can't see?
00:08:28.13 We got to work with a lot of leading scientific visualization experts and scientists.
00:08:34.12 And right now I've been really focused on...
00:08:37.09 We're moving to the San Francisco Bay; the Exploratorium is moving.
00:08:41.16 And we've been doing a lot of new work about sort of cutting edge marine science.
00:08:46.23 So, what's in the water? How do we study it? How does it relate to climate change?
00:08:50.19 So, that project is also really fun.
00:08:55.29 I think overall I really love my job.
00:09:00.16 I think I've probably expressed that it's really meaningful to me.
00:09:03.20 I feel like I am doing something that really makes a difference.
00:09:05.23 It's extremely creative and I love getting to do something that's multi-disciplinary.
00:09:09.26 Of course, at a cocktail party people always say,
00:09:12.19 "Oh! Your job sounds so cool! You're so lucky you work at a museum."
00:09:16.23 It is a really fun job, but you know for every brainstorm session
00:09:21.17 where we're thinking about a new art piece or how to design the space,
00:09:26.10 which is very fun, there are many hours spent doing budgets, writing proposals,
00:09:31.25 negotiating for staff. So I think a lot of the things that any job has-
00:09:37.00 there are a lot of behind the scenes things that aren't so glamorous.
00:09:39.29 The other thing for anybody who's considering a career
00:09:43.15 in a museum is that there aren't a lot of museums.
00:09:47.15 When there is a museum a lot of people don't leave very often
00:09:50.11 so there aren't tons of jobs, and the jobs that there are don't pay very well.
00:09:56.01 So, it's definitely a labor of love.
00:09:59.15 So I guess, hopefully today what I've gotten across to you
00:10:03.05 is why I think science museums are so important in communicating science to the public
00:10:08.14 and a little bit about my journey from science fair champ to museum curator.
00:10:16.00 And if you are interested in a career in museums,
00:10:18.02 I would definitely suggest going to talk to someone at your local museum and find out how you can get involved.
00:10:24.05 Thanks.

This Talk

Speaker: Jennifer Frazier

Audience:

General Public
Student
Researcher

Recorded: June 2011

Talk Overview

Jennifer Frazier believes that science museums can be interactive and fun and play an important role in educating the public. She tells us how she came to be a project director at the Exploratorium and how her job lets her interact with fellow scientists as well as artists, designers and educators.

Speaker Bio

Jennifer Frazier

Jennifer Frazier has been at the Exploratorium, a hands-on science museum in San Francisco, since 2004. Before joining the Exploratorium, she created exhibits, multimedia, and documentary films at NOVA, the National Academy of Sciences, and several companies. Jennifer received her Ph.D. in cell biology from the University of California, San Francisco. Continue Reading