In addition to this there will be various locally

produced shows; health shows for example, on the commerical channels plus much educational TV though the non-commercial channels. The figures for these I cannot estimate.

From the above, I draw out two figures:

In the U.K., general audience science TV totals nearly 200 hours per year.

In the U.S. a comparable figure is probably near 100 hours per year.

DISCUSSION

It is for you to decide whether four hours of science TV available per week is "better" than two. I can only offer evidence of audience appetite.

a. As a general rule any survey of audience needs done by PBS identifies "science" and "wildlife" as areas where they want more

programs.

b. NOVA is consistently, year in and year out, one of the biggest rated PBS shows. As an example the last show measured reached 4,200,000 homes (5.5% of all U.S. Television households). In the same week, CONNECTIONS reached 3,280,000 homes (4.3% of all U.S. television homes).

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C. The NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC specials are almost invariably among the most watched individual programs in every PBS year.

a.

In the area of wildlife, a whole array of indicators of interest (membership of clubs, sales of binoculars, etc) is rising although audiences for Wildlife TV shows are on average, falling.

I admit that all these points are only small indicators but to me they add up to suggest that there is an appetite for more sciencebased television than now reaches that small silver screen.

This I believe is supported by the British experience:

I see

no obvious reason why the appetities of the two countries should be so fundamentally different for science information on television.

Mr. BROWN. Thank you very much, Mr. Rhodes.

I now call on Dr. Joel N. Bloom, vice president, Association of Science-Technology Centers.

STATEMENT OF DR. JOEL N. BLOOM, VICE PRESIDENT, ASSOCIATION OF SCIENCE-TECHNOLOGY CENTERS; DIRECTOR, FRANKLIN INSTITUTE SCIENCE MUSEUM AND PLANETARIUM

Dr. BLOOM. I would like to begin by thanking the chairman and Congressman Pease for drawing attention to the differences between expressions of support and dollars of support. I am submitting a written statement and I will try to summarize my position.

Most of us tend to think that school and education are synonymous. Actually most education takes place out of school-from the young child trying to get mother's attention, to the senior citizen trying to survive on a fixed income. We call this education informal education and because it is so all pervasive it tends to get neglected.

If education is a stepchild of the National Science Foundation, museums are an illegitimate child of a stepchild. The Nation is going to be spending about $12 million in support of art museums, and some $8 million essentially in support of history museums this year, yet NSF with its over $1 billion budget will be spending about $1 million in support of compatible public programs in science museums.

I hate to talk about museums, because they are meant to be experienced; so I will show you some slides.

Museums go all of the way back to ancient Greece. This is the Greek God Zeus. Legend has it that he had nine daughters who sang and danced to make people forget their sorrows. People liked that very much, and they soon established palaces in their honor, and they called those palaces museums. Museum in Greek means palace of the muses, and since then we have had museums.

This is a picture of another "Greek temple". It happens to be in Philadelphia-the institution I am associated with, the Franklin Institute. We serve almost 2 million people a year. What do we do? We are an informal learning center.

This means: "hands on" [slides]; "self-structured" [slides]; "lifelong" [slides]; "no grades" [slides];; "no prerequisites" [slides]; "informal groupings" [slides]; and "can't flunk" [slides].

I was trying to make the point here that one can't flunk a museum. [Slide of sad-looking child.] This young man looks like he did flunk. Maybe he is just thinking about how the world will be when he grows up. [Series of slides showing positive and negative results of science and technology.] Are we going to have this or this? Are we going to have this or this? This or this? Yet, I believe that we can make this a better world for our children and our grandchildren through the wise use of science and technology, but the wise use of science and technology is dependent on widespread public understanding of science and technology, an understanding which requires the fullest possible involvement of both the schools and the informal educational institutions such as TV, print media and science museums.

Science museums of all kinds represent the largest, most concentrated audience for informal science education in the United States. More than 160 million visits a year are made to such museums, nearly

half of all museum visits. For comparison, the total annual attendance at professional footfall, baseball and basketball games is 50 million persons, less than one-third the visits to science museums.

Science on television attracts regular audiences of 5 million viewers, with as many as 10 million watching science specials. The circulation of science magazines is roughly 5 million, with an "impact" [single issues reaching readers] of more than 40 million a year. Together, museums, magazines, and television create more than 200 million interactions with science each year, rich in experience and content, and comparable in number to the size of the U.S. population.

To take advantage of this vast audience, we urge that this subcommittee adopt the following steps to insure that science education, and general public science literacy as a component of that education, receive appropriate support by Congress and the National Science Foundation:

1. The subcommittee should make a strong reaffirmation of the necessity and importance of science education as a significant responsibility of NSF. It should emphasize the significance of both professional, technical training of scientists and engineers to insure a healthy, viable scientific community, and of general science education for children and adults, in school and out.

It should assert the importance to our Nation's citizens of their ability to make informed judgments involving science and technology in matters of public concern and in their daily lives. It should assert the right of citizens to effective access to that heritage through schools, musuems, media, and other sources.

2. The subcommittee should review present NSF support for informal science education, and examine the critical situation that has developed in science museums, as a result of shifts in support patterns of other Federal agencies. NSF should be asked to insure that science museums receive an appropriate degree of support for museum projects concerned directly with public understanding and knowledge of science and technology. The recommendations of the Federal Council on the Arts and Humanities' Museum Working Group should be followed, and support for museum project activities involving science and technology developed that at least parallels the creative and well-managed programs of the Arts and Humanities Endowments. This should be supported in the future at a funding level comparable to that of the Endowments, $10 million per year. Future appropriations for the activities of science museums on behalf of science literacy should depend on needs assessments and further studies of the field, taking into account the heavy burden of expense generated by massive public audience and by the rapid changes in science and technology itself that necessitate continued investment in new exhibits, displays, and programs of interpretation.

3. The subcommittee should encourage further liaison and project sharing between NSF and other Federal agencies, particularly the two Endowments, the Institute of Museum Services, and the National Museum Act. For example, at present, museums of all kinds are eligible as cultural institutions for challenge grants from the two endowments. Science museums have become increasingly concerned that restrictive definitions may reduce their eligibility for these awards. The impact of such changes should be reported to the relevant congres

sional committees, and any future changes in challenge grant eligibility should require coordination among agencies, like that taking place under the auspices of the Federal Council. Challenge grants involving science museums should be brought under the existing joint funding agreement of NEA, NIH, and NSF, so that NSF would be. able to participate in the review of these grant applications.

4. In the division of responsibility for science education between NSF and the new Department of Education presently being structured, careful attention should be paid to the relationship between school and museum science education, and agreement reached to insure that school support programs for science within the new Department are integrated with museums programs involving science.

In conclusion, the ability of our Nation's citizens to make informed judgments about issues involving science and technology is an essential "survival skill" in today's world. To distinguish claim from counterclaim in the heated debate over carcinogens by food additives, to make personal use of the vast improvement in scientific knowledge of health and medicine and to understand the science which underlies current discussions about future energy sources, all require a public literate in science, knowledgeable about scientific debate and disagreement, and familiar with the processes of reasoning for which science is still one of our best models. In short, our citizens need to be knowledgable about science and technology as an essential part of our civilization.

Unfortunately, America's citizens will not know about science and technology simply because research and development are being carried out. Education resources are required. Interpretation programs must be developed. Exhibitions must be created and built. Specialists in the presentation of science and technology to public audiences must study and attack the problems of public perception and understanding that exist, and work out solutions to these problems.

One of the greatest failings of America's scientific and technological enterprise is its inner directness, its assumption that if support is provided, if research and development goes on, that benefits will inevitably follow, and that citizens will come naturally to understand and appreciate what has been done. The integration, explanation, and communication of science and technology to our citizens will happen only if the pursuit of science literacy in all its forms is nurtured, supported, and identified as a significant priority of the technological community, of the National Science Foundation, our Nation's leader in research and development, and by the Congress itself. It is the duty of this subcommittee to insure that this is so.

[The prepared statement of Dr. Bloom follows:]