A year ago, central Victorians rallied to save the Discovery Science & Technology Centre in Bendigo.

With the support of the community, the centre has not only survived – it is flourishing. 

The generosity with which people donated when Discovery lost its backing from the Bendigo Trust has given it a strong financial position from which to work from.

The money not only covered the centre’s running costs, it funded the new Minibeasts exhibit that has been inspiring children to learn more about insects. 

The threat of Discovery’s closure inspired people who might not have otherwise had much to do with the centre other than taking their children for the occasional visit to be proactive.

“We re-jigged our governance body so that we had people on the committee who knew about management,” Committee of Management chair Katherine Legge said.

Experts in human resources, marketing, law, business, and education were keen to get on board. 

In the past 12 months, Dr Legge said the committee had stopped worrying about Discovery’s survival.

“It’s more like, how can we thrive?” she said.

Discovery general manager Jonathan Ridnell said visitation numbers spiked while the centre was in crisis, and had been up on the same time 12 months earlier ever since.

He said the centre was an important educational tool for young children. 

“You need to excite kids about science and technology in prep, grades one, two and three,” Mr Ridnell said.

“If they’re not into it by grade four, they are never going to get into it.”

Dr Legge said one of the highlights of the past 12 months had been the pilot Reconceptualising Maths and Science Teacher Education Programs program.

Discovery science communicators helped equip more than 100 La Trobe University student teachers with tools to inspire students to enjoy science, technology, engineering and mathematics. 

The teachers then had to use those skills to educate to a class of primary school students, including taking them on a visit to Discovery. 

Almost 1000 children from the Bendigo area were involved in the program, which took place in May.

The committee of management aims to expand the program to La Trobe’s pre-school student teachers. 

“It is a critical project, when you start looking at education in Australia and the world,” Mr Ridnell said. 

“Less than half of primary school teachers are comfortable teaching science and technology because they don’t have a science and technology background.”