AUDIENCES

Engaging individuals and communities throughout Scotland

The Scottish Seabird Centre welcomes 165,000 visits to our Science and Discovery Centre each year. Our wider, conservation, education, community, and experience activities engage almost 1000 through outreach, a further 1000 through our annual Marine Fest, and nearly 1500 via our learning programmes. We also welcome a further 8600+ people on our guided wildlife boat trips to islands in the Firth of Forth. This range of activities enables us to engage diverse audiences, inspiring them to learn about, and care for, Scotland’s stunning marine wildlife and habitats.

The diversity of our audience and network of partners also gives us the opportunity to contribute to efforts that address the inequalities that exist in our society. For example, findings from a series of focus groups led by Fair Start Scotland highlighted employment barriers that include unsuitable working environment, discrimination, lack of access to childcare, lack of access to training and qualifications, and low confidence. (Source: Scottish Government, January 2023).

Through funding, volunteering connections, and partnerships we were able to address some of these needs during the latter half of 2022 by developing several nature-based sessions with BME Groups (LINKNet mentoring), young people (North Berwick Youth Project, Venture Trust), Care Home residents, and individuals experiencing mental health problems (Changes), helping to build social confidence, skills and experience. We look forward to extending this work as part of our 2023 activity plan.

The recruitment of a new Education Officer also gives us the opportunity to build fresh partnerships with Scottish schools, colleges and Universities, strengthening our learning programmes to deliver curriculum outcomes and inspire curiosity about marine science research and careers.