History and Background

The Educators' Roundtable traces its roots back to the mid-1990s, when educators from several Santa Barbara-area museums began to meet to share experiences and discuss opportunities for collaboration. By the late '90s, the group had taken on a more formal structure, selecting officers, holding meetings on a regular schedule, and recording minutes. The group first identified itself as the “Museum Educators Roundtable” in the minutes of the April 28, 1999 meeting.

The organization grew to represent more than two dozen educational entities, extending from Montecito to Solvang. Many of the educators who joined the group over the years came from institutions and agencies that were not, in fact, museums. Accordingly, in 2003, “Museum” was dropped from the name and the organization became the “Santa Barbara Educators' Roundtable.”

In 1998, the group was discussing the possibility of publishing an educational “Kid's Page” in the Santa Barbara News-Press. For a time, the page was going to be called Discovery Zone. It would be in full-color and would appear once a month. Eventually, the name Plugged-In was adopted. The first issue was published on Sunday, Dec. 26, 1999. The topic was “The Millennium.”

Other partnership projects that were being discussed by the group as early as 1999 were a cooperative website and a “passport” program that would encourage local families with young children to visit Roundtable member institutions. Passport To Santa Barbara became a reality in 2001. The website went online in 2006.