Creatividad silvestre/Wild Creativity Exhibit Summative Evaluation Report

The OMSI Engagement Research and Advancement team collaborated with Rockman et al Cooperative – an education research and consulting firm – to conduct the summative evaluation of the exhibit. The research questions for the summative evaluation looked at the success of the exhibit in terms of 1) visitor engagement –
whether visitors enjoyed themselves, saw personal relevance in the exhibit content, and were interested in its educational themes; 2) engineering practices – whether the design challenges presented throughout the exhibit prompted visitors to engage with various key engineering practices identified through an extensive research process; and 3) visitor understanding and awareness – whether the exhibit successfully conveyed information about biomimicry and engineering. To answer these questions, the evaluation team conducted surveys and interviews with groups exiting the exhibit to look at self-reported attitudinal and awareness outcomes. The team also conducted observations throughout the exhibit to look at engagement levels with different key components and groups’ use
of different engineering practices at the design challenges.