Assessing the economic impact of science centers on their local communities

Evaluation of the impact of science centers and museums is a growing field of study, because of trends such as increasing competition and financial pressure, demands for greater public accountability and transparency, and government policies that require public institutions to demonstrate their achievements in a variety of areas. As part of this growing focus on impact evaluation, the Association of Science-Technology Centers and a number of individual science centers have jointly funded an international study of the impact of science centers on their local communities. Phase 1 of this study, in 2001–02, resulted in an annotated bibliography of 180 items relating to impact evaluation, and produced a model which divides the impacts of science centers on their communities into four categories: personal impact, societal impact, political impact and economic impact. This report describes Phase 2 of the international study, focusing on the economic impacts of science centers on their local communities.