Back
 Lifetime
learners are never on vacation from their favorite pastime.
And so it was this past summer at Carnegie Museums: packs
of kids at science and art camps, excitedly taking over
the grounds of our facilities; tour groups taking in the
sights, the history, and the ideas presented at our four
museums; and families enjoying time together in places
where simple conversation—about what makes a plane
fly, where all the dinosaurs went, and what a contemporary
artist is really saying in his art—is the order of
the day.
It’s a wonderful thing to be a vehicle of
learning and inspiration for so many people. In that, we
feel quite fortunate. But we also feel an incredible
sense of responsibility when we consider the many individuals
who might never benefit from all that our museums have
to offer.
The time to become a lifetime learner, of course,
is when we are young. As the new school year begins, that
fact
is on the minds of teachers, school administrators, and
parents everywhere. And it’s on our minds, too, as
our museum educators continue to seek out creative opportunities
to ensure that the spark of curiosity alive in every child
doesn’t get extinguished for lack of trying.
In this
issue of Carnegie magazine, you’ll read
a lot about what the influence of creative arts and science
programming can mean to a child. Mark Roosevelt, superintendent
of Pittsburgh Public Schools, talks about it in his Face
Time interview. He notes that “the worst
thing to have is a child who is just disinterested and
unaffected by anything in their environment, and the arts
are clearly an underutilized tool to break through that
indifference.” Studies have shown exactly that, as
you’ll read in the feature story Crafting
the Community Classroom, a report on the many
meaningful collaborations between Carnegie Museums educators
and Pittsburgh
Public
Schools. These programs aren’t just about art or
science. They’re about life.
Just consider the enthusiasm
of Simone Davis, a teenager from Perry Traditional Academy
and “youth explorer” with
the Science Center’s Science in Your Neighborhood program. “Before
I started SIYN, science was just another boring subject,” she
says. “Now I see
science in everything—ice cream, pop, television—it’s
in all the fun stuff in life.” Consider also the
excitement of Garrett Sandidge, who exhibited his sculpted
chair at Carnegie Museum of Art through the museum’s
renowned Art Connection program. “The chance
to display something in a top museum was a dream,” he
says. “I
love telling people I’ve exhibited at Carnegie Museums!” These
are transforming experiences—the kind that last a
lifetime.
You’ll read about still more transforming
experiences, people, and programs in this issue of the
magazine: the
wonderful environmental work at our biological field station,
Powdermill (our cover story); the new PPG-sponsored Science
on the Road program at the Science Center; and the great
work of the Girls, Math & Science Partnership, now
a program of the Science Center. And as you read, you can
be quite proud—because as a member of Carnegie Museums
of Pittsburgh, you help make all of this possible. For
that, we thank you.
Sincerely,
David Hillenbrand, President
Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh
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(c) 2006 CARNEGIE Magazine. All rights reserved.