Marie Hobson Cmrs Email & Phone Number

London, England, United Kingdom

Responsible for establishing, co-ordinating and implementing a multi-site programme of audience research to help the Museum understand its audience, make evidence-based decisions that put visitors at the heart of what they do & measure the organisation’s impact.

In this role, I was responsible for: setting and delivering the research and evaluation strategy for the Museum; providing practical research to inform the development and delivery of the Museum’s offer; developing partnerships with academic institutions and using audience insight to inform the Museum’s strategic direction.

Helped organise and run events, including socials, trainings and the annual conference. This included developing calls for proposals, assessing submissions, supporting speakers and hosting sessions.

London, United Kingdom

Commissioned, managed and disseminated research about the heritage sector as well as evaluations of the National Lottery Heritage Fund's grant programmes to inform the organisation's strategic direction and to benefit the sector.

The aim of REV is to stimulate and help facilitate research and evaluation in science centres and museums across Europe. I led this European wide steering committee to design and deliver an annual pre-conference workshop to museum professionals on a topical issue relating to research and evaluation. Join the REV group on Linked In or @Ecsite_rev to contact other members and contribute ideas for the annual pre-conference.

Advocated for best practice in the research and evaluation work that was conducted on exhibitions and digital projects by providing consultancy and training or by conducting my own research. Contributed to the development of the strategy and research agenda of the Learning Research and Evaluation team as well as the development of a learning research agenda for the natural history sector. Recruited, trained and managed volunteers, interns and student researchers to… Show more Advocated for best practice in the research and evaluation work that was conducted on exhibitions and digital projects by providing consultancy and training or by conducting my own research. Contributed to the development of the strategy and research agenda of the Learning Research and Evaluation team as well as the development of a learning research agenda for the natural history sector. Recruited, trained and managed volunteers, interns and student researchers to conduct research in the Museum. Built a body of knowledge about learning in informal settings through producing literature reviews and research summaries. Show less

Conducted and managed the research, evaluation and advocacy on a range of projects during front-end, formative and summative stages using both quantitative and qualitative methodologies. My main focus was on understanding visitors’ awareness, knowledge of and attitudes towards complicated and controversial science topics, particularly climate science. As part of this, I developed a mental model of visitors' knowledge of climate science to identify misconceptions and gaps in knowledge to… Show more Conducted and managed the research, evaluation and advocacy on a range of projects during front-end, formative and summative stages using both quantitative and qualitative methodologies. My main focus was on understanding visitors’ awareness, knowledge of and attitudes towards complicated and controversial science topics, particularly climate science. As part of this, I developed a mental model of visitors' knowledge of climate science to identify misconceptions and gaps in knowledge to inform the development of the atmosphere...exploring climate science gallery. These findings also informed the government's communication strategy for climate change and are quoted as evidence in the House of Commons Select Committee’s 2013-14 inquiry into communicating climate science. They have also been published in a book about science communication. Show less

Talk Science aims to give secondary school teachers the skills and confidence to run discussion-based activities around contemporary science topics to their students through teacher training courses and classroom resources. I was the evaluator of this project during its early development and delivery phases and conducted research and evaluation with teachers to inform the development of CPD courses, ITT courses, classroom resources and a website for this audience. Carried out the long term… Show more Talk Science aims to give secondary school teachers the skills and confidence to run discussion-based activities around contemporary science topics to their students through teacher training courses and classroom resources. I was the evaluator of this project during its early development and delivery phases and conducted research and evaluation with teachers to inform the development of CPD courses, ITT courses, classroom resources and a website for this audience. Carried out the long term impact assessment of the Talk Science teacher CPD course by relating it to the Guskey Model of CPD which resulted in a publication. Show less

Education record

Doctor Of Education (Ed.D.), Organisational Learning In Museums

I explored my professional practice as an audience researcher through conducting studies into the professionalisation of visitor studies.

Ma, Museum Studies, Distinction

Specialist area of study: museum education

Ba (Hons), Archaeology, 1St Class

Education record