What does it mean to be a person of character? Dr. Arthur Schwartz, President of Character.org, explores this question deeply in his discussion with Arthur G. Affleck, III on the ACM Podcast: Empowering Young Minds. Through his expertise and passion for character education, Dr. Schwartz unveils how moral development influences individuals, communities, and society as a whole. This blog dives into the key takeaways from his conversation, shedding light on the transformative power of character-building at every stage of life.
Dr. Schwartz’s dedication to character education began with an unforgettable experience during his tenure at the School District of Philadelphia. Witnessing a young student lose hope sparked a profound question: How does a 15-year-old come to such despair? This question led him to Harvard University, where he studied adolescent moral development. His journey didn’t stop there—it expanded to a broader focus on virtues like grit, altruism, and gratitude through his work at the John Templeton Foundation and collaborations with thought leaders in positive psychology.
From the start, his mission has been clear: equip individuals with the moral courage and habits needed to make decisions that align with their values.
What is character? Dr. Schwartz defines it simply yet powerfully: Doing the right thing, at the right time, in the right way, for the right reasons. It’s not just a matter of performing good deeds but embedding those actions into one’s identity and habits. Schwartz emphasizes the importance of character beyond individual development—it’s essential for nurturing stronger families, ethical workplaces, and robust educational systems.
In his leadership at Character.org, Dr. Schwartz promotes a vision where character isn’t isolated to schools but woven into all aspects of life. His holistic approach includes engaging parents, fostering character in afterschool programs, and encouraging workplaces to adopt principles like “hiring for character and training for skills.”
Dr. Schwartz highlights that character education is most effective when it begins early and extends across various environments. His organization focuses on creating “Schools of Character” guided by 11 principles of effective character education. These principles emphasize shared leadership, community involvement, and sustained commitment to values.
One standout initiative is Character.org’s Growing Goodness project, which showcases how early childhood programs foster character across four key domains:
Each domain reinforces the idea that character-building is a collective effort involving teachers, parents, and community members.
One of the most innovative applications of Dr. Schwartz’s framework is its integration into children’s museums. Supported by the Lilly Endowment, this initiative transforms museums into hubs for fostering intellectual character and curiosity. These spaces inspire children to ask questions, explore their creativity, and develop a love for learning.
Dr. Schwartz envisions museums leveraging universal principles like the Golden Rule, encouraging both children and caregivers to embody.
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Character.org is a non-partisan organization that advocates for character education whose mission is to provide global leadership, voice, and resources for developing character in families, schools, and organizations. Character.org is comprised of educators, researchers, business and civic leaders who care deeply about the vital role that character will play in our future. Their work empowers people of all ages to practice and model core values that shape our hearts, minds, and choices.
Fostering Character Through Children’s Museums aims to help children thrive during childhood and develop into engaged, responsible, and caring adults. Since November 2023, ACM, through a multi-year $1 million grant from Lilly Endowment, Inc. (the Endowment), is working to engage and support a cohort of 23 children’s museums* that have received planning grants from the Endowment.
Empowering Young Minds, the Association of Children’s Museum Podcast is available on all major listening platforms, including: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Amazon Music.
Foto © Achim Bieniek
We are excited to share that Salon Stolz has received the 2024 Austrian Inclusion Award and has been nominated for the European Museum of the Year Award EMYA 2025.
Salon Stolz was awarded the Austrian Inclusion Award 2024 in the Leisure & Culture category with the following justification:
“Salon Stolz in Graz offers an inclusive exhibition about the composer Robert Stolz, which is also accessible to people with different impairments, for example through tactile objects and sign language.”
In cooperation with Lebenshilfe Austria and Austrian Lotteries, eight innovative organisations and initiatives were honoured for their commitment to a more inclusive society and the removal of barriers for people with disabilities.
Further Information: https://www.lebenshilfe.at/inklusion/inklusionspreis/
42 European museums have been nominated for the European Museum of the Year Award 2025. Salon Stolz is part of the prestigious international group alongside the second Austrian museum, the Wien Museum. The winning museum will be chosen on 24 May 2025.
Further information: https://europeanforum.museum/news/emya2025-nominees-are-now-announced
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The Salon Stolz aims to bring Robert Stolz and his extensive oeuvre into the present day and to make the passionate composer and conductor known to the target group of children and families.
Our exhibition consists of seven interactive stations that give visitors a playful understanding of the subject of music. Visitors can, for example, play melody memory, build sound stories or conduct the Graz Orchestra with VR glasses.
The highlight of the museum is the dance theatre “Melodia”. Two dancers take visitors on an enchanting journey through the life of Robert Stolz, which is retold through dance. Dancing along is expressly encouraged.
Museums today are at a crossroads, evolving from places where history is preserved into dynamic spaces that foster learning, spark creativity, and build community. They have become essential hubs of education and engagement, particularly for underserved populations. But the journey of transformation for these institutions is not without challenges. In the most recent episode of Empowering Young Minds, Laura Huerta Migus, Deputy Director for Museum Services at the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), explored the current state of the museum field, the challenges museums face, and their role in shaping a brighter future for communities around the world. Her insights shine a light on the vital work museums do and the strategies they need to adopt in order to thrive in an ever-changing world.
At the heart of Laura and Arthur’s conversation is the recognition that museums are no longer just buildings filled with artifacts. As Laura notes, they are dynamic institutions that play a pivotal role in the educational and cultural fabric of society. These spaces offer much more than a window into the past; they provide essential services that help foster curiosity, inspire creativity, and encourage learning.
Children’s museums, in particular, have been pioneers in shaping the visitor experience. These institutions encourage children to interact with their surroundings in ways that are both educational and fun, breaking down barriers to learning by making it hands-on and accessible. But there’s a gap that many institutions face—between delivering inspiring programs and managing the operational demands that sustain these spaces. One of the key points that Laura raises is that, while many museums excel at creating community-focused programs, they often struggle to manage their operational needs effectively. This reality is not new, but it’s become more pressing in today’s complex landscape.
There is a growing list of challenges that museums face today, ranging from funding shortages to dealing with natural disasters, demographic changes, security threats, and even political tensions. The museum sector, like so many others, was hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic, which forced closures and led to a drastic reduction in visitor numbers. While some institutions have since reopened, many are still struggling to return to pre-pandemic attendance levels.
Additionally, as Laura explains, the philanthropic landscape has shifted dramatically. Museums can no longer rely solely on traditional sources of revenue, such as donations or ticket sales, to keep their doors open. They must now think more strategically about sustainability and innovation. This means moving away from short-term fixes and instead developing long-term business models that support both their educational mission and their financial needs.
Beyond financial struggles, museums are also grappling with societal and political changes. Laura points to several incidents where museums have faced bomb threats, digital disruptions, or have been caught up in the so-called “culture wars” over diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives. In certain areas, even mentioning DEI can provoke controversy, and this has put additional strain on institutions trying to navigate an increasingly polarized environment.
Despite these daunting obstacles, Laura and Arthur are optimistic about the potential of museums to emerge stronger and more resilient. Museums have always been adaptive, and now, more than ever, they are being called upon to rethink their operations and their role in the community.
Museums for All— an initiative that highlights the power of accessibility in creating lasting community impact. Launched in 2014, Museums for All was designed to make museums more accessible to low-income families, allowing them to visit participating institutions either for free or for a small fee. The program has been a tremendous success, with millions of visits facilitated and over a thousand museums participating across the United States.
This initiative is a prime example of how museums can redefine themselves in the public eye, moving away from being perceived as elitist spaces and toward being inclusive community hubs. Laura emphasizes that the program didn’t come from a top-down directive; it was born out of the needs and feedback from the field itself. This grassroots-driven approach reflects a growing recognition that museums need to engage with the communities they serve, rather than simply providing content in a one-sided way.
The Museums for All initiative is more than just a ticketing program. It challenges long-held assumptions about who museums are for, helping to break down barriers of class and education. As Laura explains, children’s museums have long been at the forefront of this shift. They were among the first to create spaces where all children, regardless of their background, could learn through play and hands-on engagement. Museums for All takes this concept further, helping museums across the country reimagine their relationships with the communities they serve.
Leadership plays a crucial role in navigating the complexities of the modern museum landscape. Laura’s insights on this topic are both practical and inspiring. She acknowledges that, for many years, museums have focused heavily on developing and delivering content, often without paying enough attention to the business side of things. But the pandemic has forced a reckoning. Museums now have to adopt an entrepreneurial mindset, balancing their roles as educational institutions with the realities of running a complex business.
This is particularly challenging for smaller institutions, many of which lack the financial and operational resources of larger museums. However, the field is starting to see a shift, with more leaders recognizing the need to strengthen their organizational infrastructures. Laura noted that the current moment represents a period of growth—a shedding of old ways of thinking in favor of new strategies that will ensure museums’ long-term sustainability.
One project that highlights this shift is the Museum Lab for Museum Professionals, a collaborative effort between the Association of Children’s Museums and the Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh. This initiative aims to provide museum professionals with the training and tools they need to adapt to today’s challenges. By investing in professional development, museums are preparing their staff not just to survive in the current climate but to thrive.
Museums are at a turning point. They are evolving into dynamic, inclusive spaces that foster learning, creativity, and community engagement. But they need the support of their communities to continue this important work.
Whether you’re a regular museum-goer or someone who hasn’t visited a museum in years, now is the time to reconnect with your local museum. Not only do these institutions offer enriching experiences, but they also provide essential services to their communities, helping to bridge gaps in education, equity, and access.
So, the next time you’re looking for a place to explore, learn, or simply enjoy some time with family, consider visiting a museum. Support the programs that make museums more accessible, like Museums for All, and advocate for the continued funding and sustainability of these vital spaces.
To hear more about how museums are transforming communities and navigating today’s challenges, listen to the full podcast episode here.
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Empowering Young Minds, the Association of Children’s Museum Podcast is available on all major listening platforms, including: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Amazon Music.
The impact of early math literacy is crucial for supporting children’s development and setting them up for a bright future. By starting early, making math fun, and meaningfully involving parents/caregivers—all areas in which children’s museums excel—we can create a world where everyone feels confidence in their abilities to do math.
ACM is excited to announce a new partnership with the Simons Foundation, Nurturing Numeracy Skills & Math Literacy in Children’s Museums, to engage and support a cohort of smaller children’s museums (annual operating budgets of less than $1 million) to develop ideas, strategies, activities, and resources. This program is funded by Simons Foundation International and administered by the Simons Foundation’s Science, Society & Culture division.
“For many people, math can be a difficult subject to engage with,” Ivvet Modinou, senior vice president of Science, Society & Culture, said. “Our goal is to support museums and caregivers to work together to find inventive, accessible ways of engaging and supporting children in their math literacy journeys.”
ACM, the foundation and participating museums will work together to create experiences—programs, activities, events, exhibit components, etc.—which will advance numeracy skills, and math literacy and confidence in children.
“ACM is thrilled to be a strategic thought partner to the Foundation and to the participating museums, working to enable the museums as they convene and co-create,” Arthur G. Affleck, III, executive director of ACM said. “The innovation and unique perspectives of small children’s museums serve as inclusive models for building experiences and building relationships to the communities we serve.”
More information about the initiative and the application process will be available on or around September 20.
ACM, together with our partnering host museum, Madison Children’s Museum, will convene children’s museums professionals across the world at InterActivity 2024: Flourish!, May 15-17.
A highlight of every InterActivity, the opening plenary session highlights a keynote presentation that leverages expert knowledge in a related field to address the issues and opportunities confronting children’s museums. This year, the opening plenary will feature three small talks speakers framing lively short presentations around the conference theme, highlighting the ways museums, communities, and the children we serve can flourish in an ever-changing world.
Lynda Barry
Cartoonist and Professor of Interdisciplinary Creativity
Drawbridge: Making Comics with Kids
How old do you have to be to make a bad drawing? Most people give up on being able to draw at about the age of eight or nine when they realize they can’t draw a nose or hands in a representational way. There is another kind of drawing that can leap right over this problem of good and bad, which can allow us to experience a way of making pictures that set the conditions for discovery and insight and can be used by anyone of any age. What might it be? Can drawing with kids bring mutual benefit?
Creativity Sparks a Flourishing Spirit
Lynda Barry has worked as a painter, cartoonist, writer, illustrator, playwright, editor, commentator and teacher and found they are very much alike. The New York Times has described Barry as “among this country’s greatest conjoiners of words and images, known for plumbing all kinds of touchy subjects in cartoons, comic strips and novels, both graphic and illustrated.” She earned a degree from Evergreen State College during its early experimental period (1974-78), studying with painter and writing teacher
Marilyn Frasca. Frasca’s questions about the nature of images and the role they play in day-to-day living have guided Barry’s work ever since. In 1979 while pursuing a career as a painter, Barry began drawing a weekly comic strip incorporating stories considered to be incompatible with comics at the time. Stories, as Barry puts it, “that had a lot of trouble in them.” Widely credited with expanding the literary, thematic and emotional range of American comics, Barry’s seminal comic strip, Ernie Pook’s Comeek, ran in alternative newspapers across North America for thirty years
Richard J. Davidson, PhD
William James and Vilas Research Professor of Psychology and Psychiatry and Founder & Director of the Center for Healthy Minds, University of Wisconsin-Madison. Founder and Chief Visionary for Healthy Minds Innovations, Inc.
The Science of Wellbeing: Teaching and Training for Healthy Minds, Brains, and Bodies
Just like being physically in shape means regular exercise, supporting one’s emotional well-being begins with a training program – for the mind. In this talk, world renowned neuroscientist, Dr. Richard J. Davidson discusses the scientific concept of neuroplasticity and how research in the lab confirms that well-being is a skill that can be taught. By learning and practicing the skills associated with awareness, connection, insight, and purpose – anyone can have a healthier mind, despite their external circumstances. Based on four decades of contemplative neuroscientific research, Dr. Davidson outlines a path to well-being for anyone in this highly relevant talk.
Human Flourishing & Well-being
Davidson received his PhD from Harvard University in Psychology in 1976. Davidson’s research is broadly focused on the neural bases of emotion and emotional style and methods to promote human flourishing including meditation and related contemplative practices. He has published over 573 articles, numerous chapters and reviews and edited 14 books. He is the author (with Sharon Begley) of “The Emotional Life of Your Brain” published in 2012 and co-author with Daniel Goleman of “Altered Traits” published in 2017. He was named one of the 100 most influential people in the world by Time Magazine in 2006. He was elected to the National Academy of Medicine in 2017 and appointed to the Governing Board of UNESCO’s Mahatma Gandhi Institute of Education for Peace and Sustainable Development (MGIEP) in 2018. In 2014, Davidson founded the non-profit, Healthy Minds Innovations, which translates science into tools to cultivate and measure well-being.
Charles Hua
Founder and Executive Director of PowerLines, Senior Advisor at the U.S. Department of Energy Loan Programs Office, and Research Affiliate at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
negative space
Discussing his climate journey—from first learning about climate change and the importance of taking initiative from his second teacher to launching a campaign for Madison Metropolitan School District to become the nation’s then-largest school district with a 100% renewable energy goal to now serving in the Biden-Harris Administration and advising on clean energy policy—Charles Hua will illustrate how the thoughtful mentorship and support he received along the way has shaped him into the person and leader he now aspires to be.
Environmental Flourishing
Charles Hua is the Founder and Executive Director of PowerLines, Senior Advisor at the U.S. Department of Energy Loan Programs Office, and Research Affiliate at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Previously, Charles advanced building electrification policy with Rewiring America. In college, Charles was appointed to serve on the Harvard Presidential Committee on Sustainability, where he helped develop and write Harvard’s sustainability plan and organized the inaugural Harvard Climate Summit. Charles has advised Fortune 500 companies and international NGOs on sustainability issues and serves on the Board of Directors for environmental nonprofits Slipstream, Energy News Network, and Clean Wisconsin. Born and raised in Madison, Wisconsin, Charles organized a campaign that successfully petitioned his school district to become the largest in the U.S. at the time with a 100% renewable energy commitment. For his work, Charles has been recognized by the White House as a 2018 U.S. Presidential Scholar, by the Aspen Institute as a Future Climate Leader, and as an Energy News Network 40 Under 40 honoree. Charles holds an A.B. in Statistics and Mathematics from Harvard College.
Barry, Davidson, and Hua will present on Thursday, May 16 at the Opening Plenary session at InterActivity 2024. For more details about the entire conference, view the preliminary program. Registration is now open.
It can be tough to discuss difficult topics with kids, but having candid conversations can help your child understand and cope with disturbing current events. ACM partnering organization Nickelodeon put together Nickelodeon’s Guide to Talking to Kids About Difficult Current Events. This guide was created to help parents, educators, and caregivers prepare for conversations with children about current events.
In addition, Nickelodeon recently shared the interview on CBS Mornings with Jamie Howard, PhD, Sr. Clinical Psychologist at Child Mind Institute, who shares age-appropriate tips for parents for navigating questions that kids may have about what is happening in Israel and in Gaza.
Traumatic and tragic events in the news can deeply affect the children and families the children’s museum field serves. As community resources and advocates for children, children’s museums can help build socioemotional supports for children and those who love and care for them.
Click here to access all the Trauma Resources curated by ACM >
With the waning weeks of the summer of 2023, children continue to make the most of every moment at Please Touch Museum (PTM) in Philadelphia. This is especially true for rising kindergarteners, who are getting ready to pack their backpacks, find their cubbies, and meet new friends. And the 80 children and their caregivers who participated in PTM’s Kindergarten Readiness Experience this summer are well-prepared for new adventures in learning. The program was recently featured in The Inquirer, highlighting the importance of social and emotional skills in preparation for kindergarten.
PTM’s Kindergarten Readiness Experience is advancing how children prepare to transition to kindergarten, ensuring they enter the classroom on their first day full of creativity, compassion, confidence, and curiosity. Entering kindergarten is a milestone for young children and families. PTM remains committed to supporting the journey from home to school by building the critical social-emotional skills needed for a successful transition.
The Kindergarten Readiness Experience was also highlighted in the American Alliance of Museums’ recent reaccreditation report, which specifically cited the program as worthy of study by other museums. Together, these remarkable endorsements help celebrate yet another way in which PTM changes a child’s life as they discover the power of learning through play.
“There’s a lot of research to suggest that if a child is ready for kindergarten, they’re going to do better in the future academically and socially [and] emotionally.
– Alyssa Liles-Amponsah, the senior director of community programs and inclusion at the Please Touch Museum via The Inquirer
It’s so important to intervene as early as possible with children and make sure they have all the skills they need to be successful in kindergarten so it sets their trajectory on a positive pathway.”
Play is a powerful experience that enriches people’s lives in museums, schools, homes, and beyond. In this latest ACM Informational Brief, The power of play in children’s museums and elsewhere, play is explained through the research-based benefits of play to children’s discovery, health and wellness, and agency, as well as through the crucial role children’s museums play in cultivating and providing access to play.
Although the benefits of play can occur in many different types of environments, children’s museums offer particularly valuable contexts for play.
Play is vital for children, young people, and adults as well. Children’s museums have vast experience in creating playful learning experiences that are age-appropriate, hands on, interactive, and joyful. Even beyond their walls, museums form partnerships and build capacity to encourage more playful learning experiences in schools, homes, parks, hospitals, airports, malls, and beyond. Children’s museums provide examples of the many ways parents, caregivers, and educators can use play to facilitate wellbeing, healthy brain development, and to make learning more effective and joyful for everyone. As children’s museums, we believe in the power of play and we strive to nurture more play and playful learning everywhere we go.
Paper commissioned by ACM | Written by KT Todd, Director of Learning and Research, Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh
