Pressing issues: Setting a sustainability agenda through media coverage of green science museums

Abstract

When museums commission green buildings, those buildings are often covered in the press. To understand the educational potential of green building press coverage, we qualitatively analyzed 96 articles about eight U.S. green science museums. We found that journalists who cover green buildings highlight green roofs, material choices, site/landscaping, and plant choices most often. Additionally, analyses showed that green building coverage catalyzed discussion of broader sustainability issues such as ecosystems, climate change, and water issues. Press coverage of sustainable architecture sets an agenda of sustainability and contributes to the larger aim of public science education.

Acknowledgment

Bingjun Frank Fan, Caroline Lesch, Tara Weng, and Katelyn Sector contributed to data collection and/or analysis.

Disclosure statement

No potential competing interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 https://app.dedoose.com/App/?Version=8.3.35.

2 One article was published in 1992, when the Boston Globe first published about renovation plans for the Boston Children’s Museum.

Additional information

Funding

This work was funded by the Michael Brill Award of the Environmental Design Research Association, the Program for Undergraduate Research Experiences at University of Missouri, the University of Missouri Research Council, and the Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program at CU-Boulder.