Director of Guest Education

About the California Academy of Sciences

The California Academy of Sciences is a globally renowned scientific and cultural institution located in the heart of San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park. Home to a world-class planetarium, aquarium, research center, and natural history museum—all under one living roof—our mission is to regenerate the natural world through science, learning, and collaboration.

Our extensive collections span plants, animals, fossils, and cultural artifacts from across the globe and throughout history. We are a diverse team of leading biodiversity scientists, educators, storytellers, designers, and communicators who work collaboratively to advance knowledge and inspire action through science and storytelling.

When you join the California Academy of Sciences, you become part of a mission-driven community that values curiosity, collaboration, and innovation. Whether you're working behind the scenes in research or engaging the public on the museum floor, your work will help connect people to the natural world and empower them to protect it.

About the Opportunity

Reporting to the Chief of Education and Learning, the Director of Guest Education is responsible for the strategy, conceptualization, implementation, and assessment of programs at the Academy, including all staff-led programs and educational presentations offered to Academy guests. The Director works most closely with managerial leaders in the Education and Learning Division, and collaborates with teams from other Divisions such as Exhibits, Guest Experience, and Sales to ensure that we are meeting the Academy’s goals for visitor satisfaction, entertainment, and educational value. As a member of the Academy Leadership Team, this individual will participate in strategic-level decision making for the Academy as a whole, in addition to representing the Academy externally to board members, donors, and partners.

• Organizational Culture
• Join a team dedicated to the Academy’s mission, vision and values! Currently, the Academy has a new strategic plan including three initiatives – Hope for Reefs , Thriving California , and Islands 2030 – that leverage biodiversity science, environmental learning, and collaborative engagement to regenerate fragile ecosystems around the world. Learn more at https://www.calacademy.org/about-us/major-initiatives .

We hope you are inspired by what we do and are excited to contribute to our mission. The mission of the California Academy of Sciences is to regenerate the natural world through science, learning, and collaboration. The Academy is looking for candidates who do great work, and we know they may come from a number of different backgrounds and experiences. We encourage you to apply even if you do not believe you meet every qualification for the position.

This position is based in San Francisco, California. The specific onsite/hybrid schedule for this position is listed below.

Key Responsibilities

Devise, articulate, and implement an innovative strategy and vision for 21st century museum-based learning experiences, in partnership with the Chief of Education, to maximize guest attendance, increase position as leaders of innovative museum learning experiences, and meet set educational impacts for our guests, such as increased science learning, climate and biodiversity literacy, and sustained commitment to agency for the natural world.

Creatively expand the Academy’s portfolio of guest programs by providing project and staff management, along with state-of-the-art and foundational resources, structures, and expert guidance to teams as they innovate new impactful ways to interpret the Academy’s mission, deliver transformative education, and connect exhibits, initiatives, and the work of Academy researchers through cohesive learning experiences.

Research, evaluate, and propose new media, technologies, formats, tools, and modalities to create person-led and human-designed transformational learning experiences on the museum’s floor.

Partner proactively and effectively enterprise-wide with IBSS (Institute of Biodiversity Science and Sustainability), other Education departments, Exhibits, Marketing and Communications and other internal stakeholders to set and consistently meet guest experience goals, educational impact metrics, and support daily attendance projections.

Collaborate with IBSS and Exhibits leadership to explore, identify, and consolidate pathways to integrate Academy’s original scientific work into programming for guests that centers on climate and biodiversity literacy and action.

Enhance the quality and modalites of authentic, transformative learning experiences in which Academy guests can participate---before, during and post-visit, creating holistic experiences that inspire individuals of all ages and backgrounds to take action towards regeneration of the natural world and about the human-nature connection.

Effectively leverage AI as a support tool for developing educational programs and for science learning.

Ability to apply emerging immersive learning and engagement technologies for cutting-edge programming.

Inspire, direct, lead, mentor, and manage a team of 20-25 public programs staff of various levels and experiences

Creatively leverage Academy educators to collaborate cross-divisionally to develop engaging and evolving fee-based programming to engage students across all age groups

Allocate and manage the budget for the department, including tracking all expenses, creating spending plans, and guiding staff to adequately request and assign resources.

Collaborate with Membership and Marketing and Communications to effectively develop and market in-person program offerings to help generate revenue for the Academy.

Help lift the Academy’s profile and impact - locally and beyond - as an innovative educational leader by developing strong external strategic program partnerships.

Develop and maintain these external partnerships with organizations and donors that will support the public engagement strategy of the Academy and our attendance and utilization goals.

Implement success metrics and evaluation tools to assess the alignment of designed programs with Transformative Education, measure learning goals set for guests, and desired external impact.

Develop, and direct the implementation of, data collection tools for impact metrics specific to guest satisfaction such as attendance to programs, level of entertainment, and value proposition of programs.

Identify and materialize opportunities for growth for the department’s staff in order to increase their expertise and knowledge on niched areas and expose them to new emerging trends for museum-based learning experience.

Actively partner with both Experience Studio on the development of offerings and with the Director of Activations to bring offerings to life in new ways.

Act as a thought partner with the Senior Director of Experience on strategy level decisions regarding guest experiences through new exhibits and immersive experiences.

Follow all Academy safety regulations and complete all People and Culture (PACT) assigned trainings

Support the Academy’s mission, vision and Academy-wide initiatives

Other duties as assigned

Qualifications: A successful candidate will have the following:

Education and/or Experience:

The ideal candidate will possess a combination of the following education and/or equivalent experience

BA/BS; preferably in science and/or environmental education, and 14+ years’ experience.

MA/MS in science, science communication, informal education, museum education with 12+ years’ experience or PhD and 8+ years’ experience.

Minimum of 7-10 years experience in designing and delivering informal science and action-focused education, including a minimum of 2 years’ working experience in programs that deliver informal science education with transformative education.

Combined minimum of 7-10 years’ s