NISE Network Forum: “Nanomedicine in Healthcare”

This study was conducted as part of the formative evaluation of the NISE Network Forum Nanomedicine in Healthcare. The purpose of the forum was to bring members of the public together to discuss the conditions under which nanotechnology applications in medicine and personal care products should be made available to the public. During the forum, participants learned about nanotechnology and its societal and ethical impacts from expert speakers, had chance to ask questions of the experts, participated in a small group discussion in which they talked about the pros and cons of releasing nanotechnology-based medical and personal care products to the public, and reported out to the larger group about their discussion. During 2007, this forum was conducted and formatively evaluated six times by the NISE Net Forum Team (which is comprised of professionals from the Exploratorium, Museum of Science, Museum of Life and Science, Science Museum of Minnesota, and Oregon Museum of Science and Industry). As a part of the presentation of the forum, formative evaluation information was collected through various sources including registration surveys, pre/post exit surveys, observations, educator debriefs, evaluator discussion debriefs, and speaker follow-up emails. This information, along with data collected through other sources, was used to help the team modify and optimize the forum for future participants and program educators. It was also felt that this data could be used to help future forum educators and expert presenters understand the needs of potential forum audiences and gain advice from past forum educators. It is for this second reason that the data is presented in this report.