When the COVID-19 shutdown first hit its peak back in April, I quit going to the gym and got my exercise by riding my bicycle around the streets of my hometown of Springfield, Missouri. They were eerily quiet. People were staying home—mostly. I say “mostly,” because there was one place,… read more →
To what extent are nature centers being affected by the partial shutdown of the Federal government? The answer is, more than you might realize. Mostly, we don’t think of nature centers as being federally-run. There are just a handful of federal facilities that actually have “nature center” in their names:… read more →
SurveyMonkey is a fascinating tool. As a part of my consulting work for nature centers, I’ve been using it—supplemented by paper questionnaires—to ask their adult visitors, members, and supporters the following question: Thinking about your most recent visit to [insert name of nature center here], which ONE statement BEST describes… read more →
In my most recent post, I profiled the work of Dr. John Falk, who I think has produced the most useful insights into nature center visitors that I’ve ever encountered. (If you haven’t read that entry, click here and check it out first. It’ll take you two minutes.) What makes… read more →
Dr. John Falk of Oregon State University has researched and written extensively about what motivates people to visit museums. His research applies to nature centers as well. If you aren’t familiar with his work and are in the nature center business, it’s overdue for you to put one of his… read more →
When I work on projects involving nature-based preschools, I team up with Rachel Larimore. Rachel is the author of Establishing a Nature-Based Preschool, and (like me) would like to see a lot more of them. I was talking to her on the phone today, and she asked me this: “Have… read more →
I read an article in the Great Lakes Echo this past week about plant poaching, the lesser-known but equally-disturbing cousin to wildlife poaching. The article quoted Thomas Schneider, a former naturalist at a state-run nature center in Michigan, who said the center made a “costly mistake” when it built a… read more →
What will be the future of nature centers under a Donald Trump presidency? I find myself wondering about that this week. Certainly, the new President opposes many things that most nature centers (and the folks who run them) care deeply about. He is likely to open more federal lands to… read more →
When a nature center and all its components are well designed, they help you achieve your goals and objectives. When they aren’t, they sometimes get in the way of the work you are trying to achieve. Because so much of the work I do involves designing new nature centers or… read more →
I like to learn about nature centers by reading their reviews on TripAdvisor, Yelp, and similar websites. There are praising remarks and critical ones, but nothing says “Kiss of Death” like a review that describes a center as “______’s best-kept secret.” The reviewers may consider “best-kept secret” to be a… read more →
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