Milestone one
Milestone 1 - due Sunday 16th August (2 weeks)
Molly - key motivations, outcomes and engagements
Kharma - Investigate other creative interventions/projects, mapping the context
Jess - key opportunities and challenges, scope
Ryo - key stakeholders
Natasha - unpacking the provocation, contextual information about the partner
Partner Name
World Science Festival Brisbane
Provocation
Project for World Science Festival Brisbane
Unpacking the provocation
Outline your initial impressions and thoughts around the provocation (Please note this is not about outlining ideas, rather about identifying impressions, interests and possible opportunities to explore).
After the presentation by Sally McRae for the World Science Festival Brisbane, it is clear that the festival has been successful in attracting a wide range of audiences as a result of their extensive variety of exhibitions and attractions. World Science Festival Brisbane has grown to be a well-established annual event whose vision is shared and supported by the Queensland Government. It has become a major tourism drawcard bringing in millions into the state’s economy as it celebrates creativity, innovation, science, technology and art in Queensland (WSFB, 2020). The festival itself lends access to audiences with little interest in science and art as well as audiences passionate about science and art. Throughout the provocation, it was evident that the festival aimed to develop their reception towards the young adult audiences predominately adults around 18-25 years old (McRae, 2020).
Sally seemed to be very interested in attracting the audience through means that are outside of the regular screen and to use technology that is more immersive and engaging e.g. VR, AR or online gaming. She was also interested in the idea of collaborating with global partners to celebrate natural events around the world e.g. earth hour, comet sightings, interactive satellite imagery. The hopes that were drawn out of the provocation towards WSFB were that they aim to deliver a different form of the festival rather than scaling it down and were also passionate about having sustainability at the forefront of it all (McRae, 2020).
As WSFB encompasses a wide variety of science and art exhibitions, we as a group were excited to find out which area we wanted to develop and build upon. There is an obvious draw to bring the festival on an online platform but we as a team were more interested in how we could accommodate a physical celebration within the limitations and scope of the situation with COVID-19.
World Science Festival Brisbane. (2020). About the Festival. World Science Festival Brisbane. https://www.worldsciencefestival.com.au/about/about-the-festival/
McRae, S. (2020). KKB385 Creative Enterprise Studio 3: Industry Provocations World Science Festival [Video]. https://blackboard.qut.edu.au/webapps/blackboard/content/listContent.jsp?course_id=_151682_1&content_id=_8656549_1&mode=reset
Contextual information about the Partner
Write a short statement outlining what the industry partner does.
WSF Brisbane is a production of the World Science Foundation who are a not-for-profit organisation headquartered in New York City. Each year the World Science Festival Brisbane takes science out of the laboratory and into the streets, parks, museums, galleries and performing arts venues of Brisbane and regional Queensland. The Festival brings some of the world’s greatest thought leaders to Queensland, showcase local scientists and performers from around the Asia Pacific region, and host the brightest and the best from previous events in New York (WSFB, 2020).
What sector does your industry partner work in?
WSFB is a festival presented by the Queensland Museum with generous support from their partners. Since the first annual festival in 2016, the event has grown to become a major tourism drawcard in its own right, attracting more than 700,000 visitors injecting more than $32 million into the state’s economy. It is one of the many highlights on the It’s Live! in Queensland events calendar, worth $880 million to the state’s economy in 2020 (WSFB, 2020).
Where and when does your industry partner operate?
The festival itself is held annually usually around March however it is assumed that WSFB and their partners would operate throughout the year in preparation. WSFB have grown to allow its festival and events to be held in many more regional areas within Queensland. The full list of cities involved in this year’s festival include Brisbane, Chinchilla, Gladstone, Toowoomba, Townsville and Ipswich (WSFB, 2020).
World Science Festival Brisbane. (2020). About. World Science Festival Brisbane. https://www.worldsciencefestival.com.au/about/
World Science Festival Brisbane. (2020). About the Festival. World Science Festival Brisbane. https://www.worldsciencefestival.com.au/about/about-the-festival/
World Science Festival Brisbane. (2020). Festival Information. World Science Festival Brisbane. https://www.worldsciencefestival.com.au/festival-information/
Key motivations, outcomes and engagement
Why does your industry partner do what they do?
World Science Festival Brisbane states in their FAQ’s page that their mission is to “…help create a general public informed by science, inspired by its wonder, convinced of its value, and prepared to engage with its implications for the future” (WSFB, 2020). As such, we can understand that WSFB intends to use science to engage many parts of the community. Also, due to their use of practical events, we can understand that WSFB intend to create a space in which their varied audiences can interact with science in fun an engaging way.
What forms do their outcomes take? Analogue/digital? Performance, artefacts, exhibition, discussions etc.?
does your industry partner engage with their audience/clients/users?
WSFB outcomes take on all sorts of formats, however in the past, these formats have been primarily physical or analogue. Which presents an issue in COVID times as they want all their content to be accessible online. During the Provocation meeting, it was noted that all the online content that WSFB has produced in the past has not done as well as they wanted (McRae, 2020). In regards to their audience, there is a large focus to families and children, often lacking access to the young adult audience.
How do they engage with their audience/clients/users?
WSFB uses various social media outlets to engage with their audience. Between Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter, Facebook is definitely the standout in regard to engagement which aligns with their local outreach and general audience demographics. As was discussed in the Provocation meeting, WSFB has also trialled live events on these sites and has often struggled with this as an engaging space (McRae, 2020). As well as this, WSFB also circulates analogue advertising across the city – flyers, banners, signs etc.
How is this engagement measured?
It can be understood that WSBF hopes that this engagement with audiences will present in outcomes of ticket sales, shows and venues selling out, crowds, and word of mouth. These are all very physical outcomes that WSFB is very comfortable with. For example, one event that WSFB had planned for the 2020 festival was Answers from the Ashes (WSFB, 2020), which was a talk that was set to be hosted at QPAC’s Concert Hall, a big prestigious venue that WSFB would only book if they were confident that their engagement would reflect in ticket sales.
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McRae, S. (2020). KKB385 Creative Enterprise Studio 3: Industry Provocations World Science Festival [Video]. https://blackboard.qut.edu.au/webapps/blackboard/content/listContent.jsp?course_id=_151682_1&content_id=_8656549_1&mode=reset
World Science Festival Brisbane. (2020). FAQ’s. World Science Festival Brisbane. https://www.worldsciencefestival.com.au/festival-information/brisbane/faqs/.
World Science Festival Brisbane. (2020). Answers from the Ashes. World Science Festival Brisbane. https://www.worldsciencefestival.com.au/event-program/brisbane/answers-from-the-ashes/
Scope
Identify the scope of their work. How many people do they reach/engage/employ?
World Science Festival Brisbane is popular among children and typically engages a large family audience, along with attracting some curious adults and academics with an interest in science (McRae, 2020). In 2019 over 200,000 people attended the festival, with almost 300 participants, performers and activity providers also involved in the festival. WSFB enlists a number of guest speakers each year including scientists, astronauts, astrophysicists and a variety of professors. WSFB is also supported by the Queensland Government through Tourism and Events Queensland and Arts Queensland, alongside Queensland Museum Network and a number of other festival partners within the industry (WSFB, 2019).
How frequently do they run?
The World Science Festival originated in New York in 2008. Queensland is currently the only global extension of the festival, with the Brisbane event first appearing in March 2016 and running annually ever since. The Queensland Museum Network has exclusive licensing to host the World Science Festival in the Asia Pacific up until 2021 (WSFB, 2020).
Are there other ways to measure their scope?
Attendees and volunteers of WSFB in 2019 expressed that they were more excited and willing to learn about science, STEM and possible career pathways after attending the festival. Partners and participants collectively agreed that WSFB makes an important contribution in STEM engagement and learning (WSFB, 2019). WSFB encourages greater STEM participation from under-represented groups, with 86% of attendees from these groups indicating that their willingness to learn more about science increased after attending the festival (WSFB, 2019).
McRae, S. (2020). KKB385 Creative Enterprise Studio 3: Industry Provocations World Science Festival [Video]. https://blackboard.qut.edu.au/webapps/blackboard/content/listContent.jsp?course_id=_151682_1&content_id=_8656549_1&mode=reset
World Science Festival Brisbane. (2019). Program Guide. World Science Festival Brisbane.
https://www.worldsciencefestival.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/PROGRAM-GUIDE_2019.pdf
World Science Festival Brisbane. (2020). About The Festival. World Science Festival Brisbane.
https://www.worldsciencefestival.com.au/about/about-the-festival/
World Science Festival Brisbane. (2019). Impact Assessment Report. World Science Festival Brisbane.
http://www.worldsciencefestival.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/ATTACHMENT-3-IMPACT-ASSESSMENT-REPORT-2020.pdf
Key stakeholders
Identify your industry partner’s key audience/clients/users
Does your industry partner have any key investors/partners/collaborators?
The main audience of World Science Festival Brisbane is a wide range of age groups, including students, families, curious adults and seniors (McRae, 2020). In 2019, more than 7,100 students attended WSFB as part of a pre-planned school excursion (QMN, 2019). The 2019 program was held with 297 participants, activity providers and performers in six locations including Brisbane, Gladstone, Chinchilla, Toowoomba, Townsville and Ipswich. It has also collaborated with more than 30 partners from the government, academia and the private sector who have contributed $3 million in cash and in-kind donations (QMN, 2019). In addition to support from Queensland Museum Network and Queensland Government, WSFB collaborates with partners to build shared visions, clearly defined results, and relationships that are premised on measurable and rewarding impacts on STEM (WSFB, 2020).
Does your industry partner have links to the community?
WSFB hosts regional programs every year. The program offers a number of free events for all ages and aims to show the way to a future career by interacting with rural and remote communities (WSFB, 2020). For example, WSFB worked with their community partner, QGC, to provide an opportunity for local participation in the Queensland community in 2017. The program provided residents in and around Gladstone, Chinchilla with the opportunity to explore the wonders of science. This has allowed their community members to understand the mysteries of past and present environments to shape the future (Future Makers, 2020).
Future Makers. (2020). World Science Festival Brisbane 2017. Future Makers.
http://www.futuremakers.org.au/wsfb2017/
McRae, S. (2020). KKB385 Creative Enterprise Studio 3: Industry Provocations World Science Festival [Video]. https://blackboard.qut.edu.au/webapps/blackboard/content/listContent.jsp?course_id=_151682_1&content_id=_8656549_1&mode=reset
Queensland Museum Network. (2019). Board of the Queensland Museum Annual Report 2018-19.
https://network.qm.qld.gov.au/~/media/Documents/QMN/Reports/QMN+ANNUAL+REPORT+2018+2019+FINAL+LoRES.pdf
World Science Festival Brisbane. (2020). Festival Partners. World Science Festival Brisbane.
https://www.worldsciencefestival.com.au/about/sponsors-and-partners/
World Science Festival Brisbane. (2020). Regional Program. World Science Festival Brisbane.
https://www.worldsciencefestival.com.au/regional-program/
Mapping the context
What is the broader field that your partner works within?
The content presented in The World Science Festival is key focused upon intertwining modern science with fun forms of education. These broader fields are executed through the use of creative practice.
What are the key ideas, considerations and trends in their field?
The scientific field is constantly expanding, this gives the festival new content each year. With the trend of environmentalism growing, science based events (including World Science Festival) are targeting audiences with eco friendly activities.
The stereotypes surrounding science have impacted how the general public perceives events such as the world science festival. The trend of science being ‘boring’ or only ‘highbrow’ needs to be broken down in order to entice regular families; students or workers to participate.
Whereas the new methods to successfully involve target audiences through interactive education as a trend that greatly support the fun but education goal off these events.
World Science Festival Brisbane. (2020). About The Festival. World Science Festival Brisbane.
https://www.worldsciencefestival.com.au/about/about-the-festival/
Investigate other creative interventions/projects
Is there anyone else working in the same area as the industry partner?
Within Australia there are numerous Science festivals that aim to excite and educate the general public. While The World Science Festival is the largest: Curiosity; Pint of Science and National Science Week run similar themed projects. Though the programs all aim to spread scientific interest they execute this objective in their own ways.
Are they doing anything different? Addressing different sectors? Using different forms? Can we learn or adopt anything from them?
For example, Pint of Science Week successfully targets an adult audience by partnering with beer breweries. Pint Of Science Week, uses this to entice attendees into fun but educational programs. This works because it draws in the intended audience and goes against the negative stereotypes of science events.
The World Science Festival could use this method by using something their target audience (18+) are already interested in to intertwine with the science theme. This would not only draw in people who are interested in science, but also those who enjoy the other element. An example of this would be to partner Science with film.
National Science Week provides an App that can track the science events in each area. Given the current global Covid 19 situation online usability and design is more important than ever. If The world Science Festival were to use an app to bring most of its content online, it would be modern, helpful and extremely adaptive to the times.
Curiocity Brisbane. (2020). About. Curiocity Brisbane.
https://curiocitybrisbane.com/
Pint of Science Week. (2020). About. Pint of Science Week.
https://pintofscience.com.au/about/
National Science Week. (2020).About. National Science Week.
https://www.scienceweek.net.au/about/
World Science Festival Brisbane. (2020). About The Festival. World Science Festival Brisbane.
https://www.worldsciencefestival.com.au/about/about-the-festival/
Key opportunities and challenges
Outline the potential opportunities and challenges identified in the provocation presentation.
There were a number of opportunities and challenges identified in the provocation presentation for the World Science Festival Brisbane. The greatest challenge outlined was maintaining audience attendance at the festival within the limitations of COVID-19. While outside gatherings are limited during this time, WSFB would ideally like to uphold the scale of the festival and present some outdoor events where possible (McRae, 2020). How international guests, panel discussions and workshops could remain incorporated in the festival are other concerns that come with the COVID-19 limitations. The solution to these challenges must also be affordable to accommodate the festival's reduced budget (McRae, 2020).
With the expectation of an online platform comes the opportunity of being accessible to a wider range of people, uniting and engaging audiences on a global level. This also provides an opportunity for the festival to expand their age demographic, specifically towards teenage and young adult audiences (McRae, 2020).
McRae, S. (2020). KKB385 Creative Enterprise Studio 3: Industry Provocations World Science Festival [Video]. https://blackboard.qut.edu.au/webapps/blackboard/content/listContent.jsp?course_id=_151682_1&content_id=_8656549_1&mode=reset
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31/08/2020
After talking to Sarah in our last weeks workshop, as a team we realised our 3 ideas that we had come up with in our milestone 2 were not going to work as individually, none of us had the skills to prototype and complete the task. As a group we were feeling a little worried and off track as we needed to come up with an idea fast that would suit all of our skill sets.
To get back on track as a team we scheduled a group meeting that was held Thursday night where we had all decided to come with a list of each of our skills, what interested us about WSFB and around 5 rough/ simple ideas so we could get our creative brains thinking.
During our meeting we discussed this and came up with 5 mean ideas:
1. Escape the science room - 3 rooms all with different themes (e.g. one space room, one environment room, one animal room) you have to get through each room to get through to the end. You have to figure out a puzzle to get through to the next room.
2. Science themed board game (similar to Monopoly with moving around the board + question cards).
3. Contest: for uni students, the topic is to reuse plastic to create a science project. Then the contestants will submit their projects online through the page of the contest. The 3 winners will receive free tickets (more suggestions for prizes please) for next year’s WSF event
4. Community page: for science students to share their projects. The aim of this community page is to create a healthy and sustainable community of science students in Brisbane. The forum also updates on similar science events/expo with student discount codes.
5. Campaign:
Phase 1: Ad campaign Aims to educate and inspire more students to do science. We tend to assume that science is big, logical, or even mind-blowing. However, science is actually what we do in our daily life (eg. like why are we have droughts, animal life and habits). WSF Brisbane will run an ad campaign in a month to educate and inspire that science is for anyone of us. The campaign can also endorse student ambassadors and influencers.
Phase 2: After influencing the mindset and understanding of the audience on what science is, in this phase, WSF Brisbane will encourage uni students, high-school students to explore science in their daily life. By recording their exploration (video or images) and submit to WSF Brisbane’s Facebook. Moreover, students’ family and friends are encouraged to like and share the post of the contestants.
We thought of these ideas by also considering our main aims which include:
Aim 1 : attract more Gen Z audience
Aim 2 : utilize low budget tech to engage audience (has to be easy to prototype)
Aim 3 : create audience engagement without technology
as well as each our individual skills and interests of WSFB. As our main aim is to generate a gen Z audience (which is us) we discussed and got into deep conversation about what would interest us, what would make us excited and want to attend/ buy/ download, and that is how we came up with these ideas. We then did a poll on our group messenger (shown in this photo) where everyone was able to vote on what they liked the best/ thought would be successful. The top 2 choices as shown in the photo is the escape room and campaign. We have sent Sarah an email to share these ideas to see what she thinks and we are just waiting on a response.
In a group meeting we also discussed team roles and who will be in-charge of what which we did up in a table (also shown in this photo).
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