Jordan Rose and Meisa Salaita of the Atlanta Science Festival

This week, we’re celebrating the Atlanta Science Festival, which runs March 9-24. We’re joined by co-founders and co-directors, Jordan Rose and Meisa Salaita, as well as festival partners from Delta, Georgia Tech, and Clorox.

The Atlanta Science Festival is an annual public celebration of local science and technology. Curious people of all ages will explore the science and technology in our region and see how science is connected to all parts of our lives. Scientists and educators from museums, local schools, universities, and companies will uncover mysteries and explain discoveries in a variety of hands-on activities, facility tours, stimulating presentations, and riveting performances to expand our community of science enthusiasts and inspire a new generation of curious thinkers.

With 100 individual events each year since the inaugural Festival in 2014, we have reached over 100,000 people. Collaborations with 100-plus community partners, including school districts, post-secondary institutions, museums, businesses, civic and community groups facilitated the festival’s success. The Festival conservatively estimated 250 million marketing and public relations impressions in 2016 through social media, out-of-home, television and radio ad buys, press releases and local celebrity support. Our evaluation data shows that our attendee racial/ethnic demographics match the percentages within the metro Atlanta region and that our Festival is reaching a wide variety of ages, with 50% of the attendee population aged 25-44 completing evaluations (no one under 14 years old completed a survey).