SUMMARY OF ESSENTIAL FUNCTIONS

The Exhibit Evaluator serves as an integral member of the exhibit project team to develop fun, educational, and memorable exhibit experiences supporting the Science Center’s mission to stimulate curiosity and inspire science learning in everyone. Under the direction of the relevant project curator and/or project lead, the Exhibit Evaluator plans, develops, and executes evaluations at all stages of the exhibit development process, analyzes data, and reports on findings to colleagues and senior management. Using the findings from the data and analysis, the Exhibit Evaluator collaborates with exhibit project teams to incorporate evaluation results into the exhibit development process. Through this work, the Exhibit Evaluator will establish a credible and practical in-house evaluation framework for the ongoing evaluation of exhibits and programs.

The Exhibit Evaluator will take on a leadership role within the department, by shaping the department’s broader evaluation strategies, spearheading new exhibit evaluation and audience research programs, and building strategic evaluation plans and community partnerships to support a variety of exhibit projects. This work is critical to the development of successful educational science exhibitions, a core business objective of the California Science Center Foundation. This work requires routine exercise of specialized knowledge, judgement, and discretion, and includes creative and innovative thinking, planning and conceptualizing, decision-making and following through with minimal supervision. The Exhibit Evaluator will report to the Curator of Life Sciences and will work as a core member of the team advancing the conceptual development a new life sciences gallery. The position is funded for two years, with the potential for extension pending additional funding and/or assignment to other projects.

SKILLS, KNOWLEDGE, AND EXPERIENCE

• Master’s degree in a social science field required. PhD or equivalent preferred.
• Minimum of three years of experience conducting education and/or behavioral research in the social sciences or a related field. Experience evaluating science exhibits, programs, or similar informal science learning experiences strongly preferred.
• Knowledge of informal science education trends, theory, and best practices.
• Demonstrated expertise in quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods approaches to data collection, analysis, and interpretation.
• Ability to exercise creativity in the design, conduct, and administration of research, evaluation or assessment activities.
• Adept at using survey building programs and statistical packages for analyzing quantitative data.
• Excellent writing and data visualization skills.
• Ability to maintain highest levels of confidentiality and discretion, and adhere to ethical guidelines for conducting research with human subjects.
• Demonstrated ability to productively and respectfully engage external community partners in exhibit evaluation projects strongly preferred.
• Experience supervising the work of volunteers, teams, and/or outside vendors preferred.
• Ability to think creatively, solve unstructured problems, engage with new ideas and divesre viewpoints with an open mind, and improve ideas based on constructive feedback from a diverse team of creative partners and stakeholders.
• Strong ability to conceptualize ideas in an evaluation framework and make rational, evidence-based arguments for the best course of action in developing successful exhibits that will be fun, memorable, educational, and relevant to a diverse audience.
• Demonstrates a high level of professional integrity and builds trust on internal teams and with external community stakeholders.
• Excellent interpersonal and verbal communication skills.
• Ability to work effectively in a team environment and develop productive relationships and good communication with departments throughout the institution.
• Ability to work independently with minimal supervision and with competing deadlines.
• Ability to work a flexible schedule as required.
• Fluency in written and verbal Spanish strongly preferred.

ESSENTIAL DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES

• Advises curatorial and senior management on strategic evaluation measures to meet the Foundation’s educational goals through the presentation of educational science exhibitions.
• Provides vision and leadership for developing a strategic evaluation framework used across all exhibit projects.
• Leads strategic research efforts to improve institutional understanding of the Science Center’s existing audience as well as new opportunities for community outreach and engagement.
• Assists in identifying key advisors and community partners for front-end and formative exhibit evaluations, and serves as a liaison with outside advisors and community partners.
• Identifies and recommends measurable indicators of success for programs and exhibitions.
• Develops evaluation plans for exhibitions at all stages of development and prototyping (front-end, formative, remedial, and summative). Uses appropriate evaluation methods for assessing the different guest experiences including hands-on activities, artifact interpretation, images, AV activities, and graphics.
• Develops evaluation protocols and instruments, including creation and validation of scales.
• Collects data including but not limited to interviews, focus groups, and surveys.
• Assists project team in the development and testing of exhibit prototypes.
• Identifies, trains, and supervises data collectors, who may be education and exhibition colleagues, volunteers, interns, contractors, or other internal staff.
• Analyzes data and synthesizes results into non-technical language and actionable recommendations for exhibit project team-members and curatorial and senior management.
• Creates well written, visually appealing research and evaluation reports and project databases.
• Supervises the work of outside consultants called upon to execute evaluation tasks that are beyond the resources available within the Science Center.
• Advises on budgetary issues related to evaluation.
• Advises staff and external consultants on the creation and implementation of evaluation plans.
• Performs other duties as required.