Abstract
Science education development is a field of many interests and a key interest is recruitment of
students who wish to pursue an education in science. This is an urgent societal demand in Denmark
as well as internationally, since highly skilled science graduates are needed for the continuous
development in the science and technology industry. Therefore, much effort has been invested to
improve science education. The importance of school external stakeholders in development of
education has been an increasingly emphasised, also in the field of science education. This has led
to a growing focus on how conditions and structures in municipalities affect the development.
Projects aiming at the municipal arena have thus been initiated and the Danish Science Municipality
Project (SM project) was such a project. Part of the SM project was to create networks connecting
different municipal stakeholder involved in science education development. These municipal
science education networks (MSE networks) were identified as important for development of
science education in the SM project. Therefore, it was a key interest to explore these networks in
order to investigate how the central stakeholders affected development of science education. By use
of social network analysis (SNA), four MSE networks were approached empirically, and the
municipal stakeholders and the relationships connecting them were mapped. The central
stakeholders were identified based on quantitative network data. Through qualitative interviews it
was possible to explore how they affected the development. The analysis showed that their
positions in the MSE networks enabled them to actualise resources among relevant stakeholders for
use in science education development and in this way they contributed to social capital in MSE
networks. This insight highlights the potentials embedded in MSE networks and the importance of
supporting central stakeholders to enable actualisation of resources in these networks in order to
facilitate development of science education in municipalities.
students who wish to pursue an education in science. This is an urgent societal demand in Denmark
as well as internationally, since highly skilled science graduates are needed for the continuous
development in the science and technology industry. Therefore, much effort has been invested to
improve science education. The importance of school external stakeholders in development of
education has been an increasingly emphasised, also in the field of science education. This has led
to a growing focus on how conditions and structures in municipalities affect the development.
Projects aiming at the municipal arena have thus been initiated and the Danish Science Municipality
Project (SM project) was such a project. Part of the SM project was to create networks connecting
different municipal stakeholder involved in science education development. These municipal
science education networks (MSE networks) were identified as important for development of
science education in the SM project. Therefore, it was a key interest to explore these networks in
order to investigate how the central stakeholders affected development of science education. By use
of social network analysis (SNA), four MSE networks were approached empirically, and the
municipal stakeholders and the relationships connecting them were mapped. The central
stakeholders were identified based on quantitative network data. Through qualitative interviews it
was possible to explore how they affected the development. The analysis showed that their
positions in the MSE networks enabled them to actualise resources among relevant stakeholders for
use in science education development and in this way they contributed to social capital in MSE
networks. This insight highlights the potentials embedded in MSE networks and the importance of
supporting central stakeholders to enable actualisation of resources in these networks in order to
facilitate development of science education in municipalities.
| Original language | English |
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| Publisher | Department of Science Education, Faculty of Science, University of Copenhagen |
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| Number of pages | 116 |
| Publication status | Published - 2016 |