Closing The Year: The Third Peer Meeting

BERLIN / MUNICH / WASHINGTON: On Monday, 13 December, the "Haus der kleinen Forscher" (Little Scientist's House) Foundation together with Siemens Stiftung and the Smithsonian Science Education Center (SSEC) met virtually for the third time this year.

At the beginning, the Peers took the opportunity to briefly report on the latest developments in their own networks. Members of Siemens Stiftung reported on the recent meeting of their Latin American STEM Network (a network across Latin America with a current total of 90 partner institutions in 13 countries). The SSEC introduced their "NESST" Project – a Network for Emergent Socio-Scientific Thinking that focuses on researching social science issues. And finally, the "Haus der kleinen Forscher" Foundation gave a brief insight into its participation to the "Connecting Networks Learning Lab" of the iac Berlin on the subject of "Impact Alliances" this November in Vienna, Austria.  

Following these updates, the Peers decided on the next steps to finalise a Memorandum of Understanding, a reference document that will form the basis for collaboration between all IDoS Peer organisations. Next on the agenda was the discussion of the next Peer members to join the International Dialogue. All three Peers unanimously agreed to invite two organisations to the IDoS Peer Network that bring great expertise in the field of Early STEM Education for Sustainable Development.

Finally, the structure and possible content of a shared position paper was discussed and decided. This new IDoS publication will focus on the importance of "Social Impact Networks" and to what extent they can promote the development of professionalisation in early STEM Education for Sustainable Development. The Peers will write the paper collaboratively. In the meantime, readers are invited to read the first IDoS paper "Using Science to Do Social Good: STEM Education for Sustainable Development", which was presented at the IDoS 2019 conference in Berlin.