Each year, the ASTC Annual Conference and Exhibit Hall provide science center professionals from across the globe with an intimate forum to exchange ideas and discuss the field’s leading issues. With over 100 conference sessions, participants are challenged to explore ways of making science centers more essential to their communities.

This year's summer meeting will occur in the Portland Hilton Executive Tower and Portland State University in beautiful Portland, Oregon. The hotel will host sessions, plenaries, and other meeting events while the campus will serve as the location for workshops during the initial days of the meeting.

For more information, visit: http://www.aapt.org/Conferences/sm2010/index.cfm

You are not just a biology teacher in a classroom, but an inspiration to your students. You appreciate the value of sharing and learning with your colleagues. You know what it takes to be a leader in life science education.

A focus on using Discovery Education streaming tools in innovative ways to connect with English Language Learners. Hear about real-world strategies and how other educators are leveraging digital media to develop the language, reading, and writing skills of their ELL students.

Do you spend a lot of time searching for high quality hands-on activities for your museum visitors? Have you developed science and math activities for out-of-school learners that you would like to share more broadly?

Join us January 25–29 for an online ASTC Connect workshop to introduce new users to the Science and Math Informal Learning Educators (SMILE) pathway of the National Science Digital Library. See the beta site at http://www.howtosmile.org/

The NSF Informal Science Education (ISE) 2010 program solicitation deadlines are 24 June for preliminary proposals and 18 November 2010 for full proposals. The program solicitation (RFP) is available here.

At the 2009 ITEST Summit, Chris Dede of the Harvard Graduate School of Education presented on “The Five Dimensions of Attaining Scale: Implications for ITEST Projects.”