Canberra's Questacon set a new visitation record in 2018-19, with more than 514,000 people representing the National Science and Technology Centre's biggest annual intake in its 30-year history.
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As well as its busiest year on record, Questacon is celebrating its busiest day; nearly 9000 people turned out to the centre's Festival of Questacon in November 2018. The centre welcomed its 12 millionth visitor in the past financial year.
The findings come as part of the Department of Industry, Innovation and Science's annual report. Questacon's centre manager, Tristan Hoffmeister, said its previous annual visitation record was about 511,000 people.
"A lot of our visitors have become advocates for Questacon; they promote us, they want to come and have their children share in the experiences that they shared over these last 30 years," he said.
The 2018-19 visitor numbers dwarfed Questacon's target of 505,000 people; the centre also engaged more than 652,000 people in national programs, compared with a target of 571,500.
The figures represent a marked improvement on 2017-18, when visitor numbers and the amount of people doing programs fell short of targets, which called for fewer people than in 2018-19.
In the report, the department put the increase down to: "record levels of visitation by school groups and paying children, increased visitation in school holidays, and attendance at the Festival of Questacon".
Mr Hoffmeister said it could also be attributed to the increasing number of schools, particularly in the ACT, the addition of more out-of-hours events, and extended school holiday times.
"General visitation to Canberra is up as well, so that helps our visitation," he said.
"In July this year, we had our busiest school holidays on record with over 52,000 visitors in 16 days. That was huge for us.
"Whether or not it will be another record year, we'll have to see, but we are certainly tracking well again."
Sydney resident Peter Greenland travelled to Canberra with his two daughters Ziva, 4, and Zali, 2, to visit Questacon on Sunday.
"We wanted to take the girls for the learning experience and spend some quality time with them," Mr Greenland said.
"We've loved it. They'll go home talking about it and they'll tell all their friends about it."
Emily Yuan and her son Ryan Zhang, 2, moved to Canberra from Sydney about a week ago. Like the Greenland family, they hadn't been to Questacon before.
"There's lots to see and explore," she said.
According to the department's report, 88 per cent of 210 teachers felt more confident teaching science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) subjects after completing Questacon's Smart Skills Teachers Workshop.
Of the teachers, 55 were surveyed six to nine months later; 82 per cent had discussed lessen ideas inspired by the workshop with their peers, and 67 per cent had applied new STEM ideas in their classrooms.
Nearly one third had replicated the tools and activities used in the workshops.
Of the 14-to-18-year-olds who attended Questacon's Invention Convention, self-reported career interests in STEM and computer studies increased by 10 percentage points immediately after the experience.
After 12 months, their interest in science had increased by 10 percentage points again, while their interest in maths and technology declined by 14 percentage points, and nine percentage points respectively.
"These findings are being used to inform the design of future programs," the report said.