In Europe, and particularly in Germany, extracurricular learning has established itself as an independent educational programme and as a supplement to school education. In addition to its contribution to general education, the importance of extracurricular education in tackling social challenges such as climate change, energy supply, social justice and sustainability is being discussed. Learning venues such as science centres, museums, school laboratories, environmental education facilities, national park houses, school research centres, farms, libraries, theatres and many more offer a wide range of creative formats and attract a great deal of attention from interested laypeople and school classes.

The investigation of these places of learning and their educational programmes is currently developing into a challenging field of empirical research. Studies on the influence of extracurricular educational programmes on situational interest, for example, are available; empirical studies of the learning processes that take place are increasingly following suit. The central questions are what influence extracurricular learning environments have on processes of perception, thinking, learning and the self-concept of visitors and how the dynamics of these processes can be modelled. It also needs to be clarified to what extent extracurricular education contributes to the public understanding of science and humanities (PUSH) and how extracurricular places of learning can be further developed in a research-based manner.

We would like to offer a forum for these research and development activities and therefore cordially invite you to the conference "Researching and developing places and processes of extracurricular learning" in Oldenburg!

With this conference, we would like to encourage the STEM disciplines, geography, the humanities and social sciences, linguistics and cultural studies as well as the artistic disciplines to participate in an interdisciplinary research discourse. We also explicitly address extracurricular educational institutions that are developing in a research-based manner through interesting networks or in co-operation with universities. In other words, we want to bring together practice-oriented researchers and research-oriented practitioners in a variety of formats.