The Science Festival Alliance: Creating a Sustainable National Network of Science Festivals Summary of Year 1 Findings

Goodman Research Group, Inc. (GRG) is serving as the external evaluator of the three-year, NSF-funded Science Festival Alliance (SFA) project with this report summarizing results from the first year of the project. First year data collection was completed in June 2010. It included: Surveys of 1,411 San Diego Science Festival (SDSF) and 1,054 Cambridge Science Festival (CSF) attendees; End-of-year focus groups with each of the festival (SDSF and CSF) team leaders; and An online survey of 11 principal Alliance team members. The report is organized around four key questions: 1. Who participated in the science festivals? 2. What were participants' motivations for attending the festivals? 3. How did participants benefit from the festivals? and 4. How has the Science Festival Alliance developed in its first year?