One of the primary purposes of this trip is to visit natural history and science museums to see what they are doing that is innovative and fresh and to spread the word about the California Academy of Sciences. Our first two visits were to the Lee Kong Chian Natural History Museum and the Science Centre Singapore.
Lee Kong Chian Natural History Museum
The sign on the Science Library building at the National University of Singapore (NUS) is small and discreet and reads, Raffles Museum of Biodiversity Research. I’d call this a very contemporary name, but it’s the old name. This museum was named for Stamford Raffles, the founder of modern Singapore, whose idea it was and himself an avid naturalist. It was founded in 1849 and later became the National Museum of Singapore. In the late 1960’s when the government decided to give greater priority to history and art museums, the Raffles collection, primarily zoological specimens, was about to be discarded when NUS agreed to take it.
The Raffles name was retired in 2014 and Lee Kong Chian Natural History Museum (as part pf NUS) was born. And soon it will have a new home. Very soon. The current museum space in the science building is closed and the re-named new museum will open on April 18, 2015 in a brand new building in another part of town.
Midst stacked boxes and evidence of a move in progress, we met with the museum director, Peter Ng, an affable and direct man who was most welcoming and happy to share the museum’s story and his insights. In 2005, he and several colleagues did a tour of natural history museums in the U.S. and visited not only the California Academy of Sciences, but also the Field Museum in Chicago, the Smithsonian, the American Museum of Natural History, and a museum in Kansas. There they learned about how American museums are financed and about fundraising.
What Peter and his colleagues have done in Singapore is unprecedented. University scientists in Singapore are not accustomed to American style fundraising and yet, with the designation of a parcel of land from the university, they raised the remaining tens of millions within the stipulated 6 month deadline for keeping the land. And they raised additional money to create an endowment. They are also approaching the operations of the museum with an eye to what Peter called financial economy; they have a corporate board, are doing marketing for event rentals, etc. and will charge admission. Peter is also keen to do more community outreach.
Everyone also told them they needed dinosaurs so they acquired three dinosaurs at a reasonable price , a “family” that the seller wanted to keep together. Dinosaurs aside, the new museum will have a Southeast Asia focus and will play an important role in the region given that Singapore is more prosperous and advanced than some of its neighbors. We encouraged Peter to return to San Francisco and see the “new” Academy and he expressed great interest in collaborating with our research colleagues, several of whom he knows well. We would love to come back in about 9 months to see the new museum in action!
The Science Centre Singapore (SCS) was closed for its regular monthly maintenance day, but we were able to check out the entrance way and the Kinetic Garden before meeting with three of the leadership team: TM Lim, chief executive; Clarence Sirisena, deputy chief executive; and Daniel Tan, acting senior director in the Projects and Exhibition Division. Their building is old by Singapore standards, 38 years, and some of it is a bit tired and cluttered. The leadership, however, is engaging and energetic and described some wonderful programs already underway as well as future initiatives.
The government is planning to build a new science centre close by on the other side of a small lake which might be ready by 2020. This is a high visibility national project as the government wants to make that lake district a destination and the centre has a track record for delivering on programs and being willing to take risks.
We talked about sustainability and how Singapore is addressing that; they have no natural resources and still rely on fossil fuels, but there are early efforts in the area of solar power and several new hotels are very green. The centre itself is collaborating with a French university on an exhibit about sustainable cities, what does it take for urban areas to be sustainable.
SCS belongs to or is part of the Ministry of Education which funds it and sees 150,000 students a year, so lots of interactions with that audience. They have worked to augment their government funding by developing partnerships with corporations and even some government agencies, primarily for exhibits, with one example being a government agency providing support for their climate change exhibit. Imagine that happening in the U.S.
Science without walls is one of their aims and they have a very successful and robust science busker program which they began in 2007. (Buskers, for those who haven’t been in London Tube Stations or on Stroget in Copenhagen, are street performers who play or sing for donations.) Applicants for SCS’s program had to audition, those selected participated in a workshop, and then uploaded videos of their performances to You Tube where they were subject to voting. Ultimately, the winners got to do a whole day of busking at the centre, were professionally evaluated, and finalists were given a contract for future performances on site and elsewhere, including occasionally in other countries.
The science centre also holds a 3-week long annual science festival which takes place in shopping malls, parks, and even attractions like Universal Studios, as well as on site. Last year they created and opened KidsSTOP, a separate place for children ages 18 months to 8 years old. As TM said, “children are born scientists.” They work closely too with school teachers and have developed a series of ten very popular science learning kits for use in the classroom. A current new project is reaching out to preschools and childcare centers and providing materials for an electricity corner and a kitchen science corner, both hands-on science learning opportunities for young children.
T
