CAISE recently conducted a study to determine the current state of the informal science education community and the degree to which it functions as an effective multidisciplinary community of practice (i.e. whether there are, in place, processes of social learning that occur when people who have common goals interact while working to accomplish those goals).

The methodology of the study was exploratory, qualitative, and phone-based. Included were high-level representatives from youth community organizations, adult community organizations, science centers, botanical gardens, natural history museums, zoos and aquariums, environmental organizations, public television and radio, science writers, health organizations, after-school science societies, large format film, extension programs, children's museums, libraries, and new media researchers.

Key results: unprompted, respondents only self-identified with their own communities--informal science education was not mentioned.

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