Since 1964, tens of thousands of Ohio school children have field-tripped inside their district school bus with teacher chaperones and headed just down the street or hundreds of miles to gape in awe and interact with the wonders of Columbus’ Center of Science and Industry (COSI) in Ohio’s capital city.
Anyone with travel plans to America’s Heartland, especially running the I-70/I-71/I-75 corridors would be amiss not to include COSI in their list of “places to see.” Typical travel time to COSI from Detroit: 3.5 hours, Indianapolis: 2.45 hours, Pittsburgh: 3 hours.
Voted the #1 Science Museum in USA Today’s “10 Best Readers’ Choice Travel Award Contest for 2020, the Center of Science and Industry was the brainchild of advertising executive, Sanford N. Hallock in the late 1950’s.
Hallock had visited a similar attraction in Chicago and felt Columbus and Ohio could benefit greatly with their own version.
After several years of considerable political and financial wrangling, Hallock was able to convince the city of Columbus to establish COSI and locate it in the recently renovated Memorial Hall building on E. Broad St. COSI remained at the location until it moved to its current location in 1999.
For $25 and under (teachers admitted for free) students and adults can partake with various exhibits in halls like The Ocean, Dinosaur Gallery and WOSU Gallery (a simulated television studio).
Adults will also be infused with newfound knowledge and entertainment: Did you know that Cuba (in collaboration with the American Museum of Natural History and the Cuban National Museum of Natural History COSI installed a Cuban bilingual temporary installation) is considered an archipelago with 4,000 islands? Or that the museum features three viewable real-life laboratories run by The Ohio State University? The over-21 crowd can also enjoy COSI After Dark events where the “big kids” can enjoy monthly, themed activities which include craft beers and mixed drinks!
Other displays include a planetarium, machinery (large-scale and military), a 4K/3D/60 frame per second giant-screen theater and a display of historical Ohio native plants.
Three seems to be the strand common to statistics related to the STEM-focused facility which sits on the bank of the Scioto River just below historic Route 40. COSI boasts a 300,000+ square foot space with over 300 interactive displays and services over 300,000 students per year in outreach programs. A whopping 33 million visitors have viewed the science center located at (you guessed it!): 333 West Broad St. in Columbus.
Educators and students can’t make it to the state capitol? No worries…COSI will come to you!
Explore topics like energy, our universe or chemistry delivered to an auditorium or stage in your own home school: COSI on Wheels is an outreach program born in 1982 and will cost approximately $1100 per visit. Or schools can opt for Interactive Video Conferencing on a variety of topics such as Introduction to Coding or In Depth: Autopsy, where students follow along with a pathologist-narrated autopsy from The Ohio State University.
When you do visit COSI (not “if” but “when”) be sure to stop by the aptly named Molecules (coffee and snacks) and Atomic Cafe (diner food) located within the complex.
Don’t forget about the Columbus Museum of Art.
