The Magic of 'The Magic School Bus' with Matt Wisnioski and Michael Meindl

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Travis

If you were of a certain age, you probably remember the television show and perhaps even the book series, The Magic School Bus. But if not, I'll try to explain it for you. It was, as its name suggests, a school bus with magical powers that would take a class of elementary school students and their teacher on educational adventures to places like inside the body of a volcano and I think they even went to space one time.

Despite the show having debuted 30 years ago, it still remains very popular. So when I heard that there were a couple of Virginia Tech researchers trying to figure out the magic behind the Magic School Bus, I instantly wanted to know more. And thankfully, Matt Wynowski and Michael Mendel were kind enough to join the podcast. Matt is an associate professor in Virginia Tech's Department of Science, Technology, and Society, while Michael is an associate professor in the School of Communication at Radford University, but also a PhD student studying science, technology, and society at Virginia Tech. Together the pair are working on a National Science Foundation project to investigate just how the Magic School Bus worked so well from a creative, educational, and financial standpoint. So we talked a little bit about the origins of the show and how they collaborated, bringing both creative folks and scientific folks together to create this project that merged the best of both worlds.

We also talked a lot about the impacts of the show itself to individuals, to the entertainment industry, and to way we do science education as a whole. And just to put it on the record, Ms. Brizle did not respond to a request for comment about the episode. Don't forget to rate, follow, and or subscribe to the podcast. I'm Travis Williams and this is Virginia Tech's Curious Conversations.

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Travis

The thing is that the book series sold 90 million copies. So it's obviously very popular. I dating myself a little bit too old, never actually watched the show, but I'm very familiar with all of the concepts. Man, I'm curious, why does this work so well? What's the magic behind the magic school bus?

Matt

That's a really good question and one of the big ones we're trying to answer through our research. you can look at it in a variety of different ways. You can say, well, why was it so successful as a kind of story and how did that contribute? You can also look at, why was it so successful at the production level? And we could look at it that way. And then what is it about the way that it was produced that allows it to last past its initial moment of creation. Because there's always, there've been great shows in the past that are no longer in circulation. And I think that for that first part, you know, in the construction of the stories themselves, I mean, one of the really vital elements that made the Magic School Bus work is it brought together leading experts in science education with top entertainment producers. So was trying to merge the benefits of government-funded scientific research with commercial entertainment. So that's number one. And then I think another dimension that made it work so well is that it brought together these talented people who just trusted each other and had a kind of creative collaboration that is rare. That it's hard to predict and make those collaborations work, but when they do, it can produce really lasting dimensions. And then the third point, and I could probably come up with some more, but the third point is that the use of animation meant that it sort of never gets old. The actors aren't aged, the production quality remains the same across time. And that allows children to experience new and to use their imagination to identify themselves in the story.

Travis

it's kind of like the last piece is kind of like the Simpsons effect of they never age.

Matt

As a man of the original Simpsons, I would say that after 20 years, things can age.

Travis

Okay. Well, you mentioned this idea of when they began, they brought together these experts in science education, as scientific experts. Who were these, I guess, scientific experts? What type of people did they bring in to pick the brains of to figure this out?

Matt

Well, to answer that, it's helpful to say a little bit about the context in which the Magic School Bus came to exist. Now, as a book series, it was a relatively small project. had an author, Joanna Cole, and illustrator, Bruce Deegan, who were connected by the Scholastic Corporation, one of the biggest kids' children's book producers in the United States and in the world.

At the same time in the 1980s, the federal government and the National Science Foundation in particular were really concerned about the scientific literacy of American children. And they were looking for new ways to reach kids who maybe weren't getting quality science education in their elementary schools. There would have been a lot of work and money put into high schools in the past. but far less so in elementary school education. at the same time, there were studies that showed that the amount of time that children spent on television almost rivaled that of the time they were in school or even when they were asleep. So how could we use these new media to produce a more scientifically literate American citizens? There was a lot of educational research that went into this. There were folks in child psychology who were interested in these questions. And then there were practicing scientists who had been very interested in science outreach and science communication. And for the Magic School Bus, a really key player in this was a group of folks in the National Science Foundation who studied what they called informal science. And they included, really critically for the Magic School Bus, a man named Michael Templeton, who had been a director of science museums and had worked as a program officer at the National Science Foundation, where he tried to broker relationships between people in the entertainment industry and scientists and science educators. And when the Scholastic Corporation approached the National Science Foundation, he was brought on as a core member of the Magic School Bus production team. So I would say he's one of the key figures. At the same time, and maybe Michael can talk about this a little bit, the Magic School Bus, because it received National Science Foundation funding, put together a really star-studded panel of Science Advisors.

Travis

And so Michael, you're doing a lot of the oral history side of you almost project. I'm curious, what did those science advisors, have you talked to them? What do they say about the origins of the show and I guess how they kind of brought it together?

Michael

Well, I think there's a couple of different groups of people that we're kind of talking about. mean, on one hand, there's the kind of advisory group that was kind of created just to give some initial feedback on proposals and the development of the series. And that's where you have these kind of groups of people like some who are, like as Matt was saying, people who are on the one hand interested in child development and child psychology, some people who are interested in informal science. And, you know, they're kind of looking at this and we have people who are, you know, going to Congress and talking about the value of, you know, things like PBS and children's education. But then on the other side, you also have the people who are really part of the production experience and pipeline.

And, know, Matt mentioned, you know, Michael Templeton, who unfortunately passed away a few years ago. But there's also Fran Nankin, who was like basically, they work together kind of in conjunction. They really were the heart of the kind of science content team. And I was able to talk with Fran as part of this project. And, you know, I think, you know, there's this idea of really looking at, you know, what can we do? What can we teach within, you know, just about 20 minutes, right? And so I think one of the things that, you know, they started really thinking about was, how much, right? And I think initially they were like, you know, we have all this stuff and all this information, all the science we want to have children know, right? And they kind of quickly realized. you know, that's just way too much. We can't just jam pack, you know, everything into this 20 minute thing, especially if we're trying to tell a story at the same time. And, you know, and they're kind of comparing themselves to some other, you know, more science, other science projects like 321 Contact, which is much more of a magazine style format, where it's just like a lot of like little segments that, you know, have a broad theme that connects them, but you're throwing a lot of information at the viewer versus here where it's like, okay, well, we want them to know science, but we also don't want to overload them at the same time. And so they create, for every episode, the science team would create a science Bible. And the task there was on the one hand to, yes, get- scientific information in there. But even at that stage, they were chast with this idea of let's find the action because especially in the TV series, it was about the plot. Part of it was about the plot, the entertainment side of edutainment. And so they knew that if we were going to tell a story, a captivating story that's going to hold children's attention, there has to be action. And they kind of started to realize that Okay, we might want to do a story about this one topic, but there's not really a lot of action in that science, right? It's just like, they don't move or there's nothing that could happen. So that would make a kind of boring story. So yes, we would love to have that, but that's not gonna make good television. So even at the science stage, even at the science content stage, they're thinking about that story.

Travis

Yeah, what grade were those kids supposed to be in? Like, fourth grade?

Matt

A little younger. So the initial audience for the program were children from six to nine years old. So for those older kids, the show that came out at the same time was Bill Nye the Science Guy, which was part of this same initiative in this merger of science and entertainment.

Travis

wow, so like a one-two punch of Miss Frizzle and Bill Nye. Well, I'm curious, saying you're 30 years from the TV show itself debuting, what are some of the ripple effects that you all are seeing from your research of that show, maybe from a television perspective or maybe from a policy perspective? What impact has it had that it's still having?

Matt

So a huge part of our research is trying to understand those ripple effects or, you know, in the parlance of the National Science Foundation, the broader impacts. You know, and that's one of the ripple effects. The whole notion that every grant funded by, science grant funded by the National Science Foundation has to explain its broader societal impacts is something that emerged alongside and with the Magic School Bus in the 1990s. So those rules went into effect in 1997 and they target all of the things that the Magic School Bus was aimed at, which is broadening understanding of science, getting young folks into scientific careers, trying to diversify who participates in science so that science is available to all using public-private partnerships to build the knowledge and strength of the country. All of these things that run throughout the Magic School Bus were part of a broader ethos that has really reshaped how organizations at the federal government and beyond think about the impact of science funding. So that's definitely one. I think then there is the question of the impact on the people who have experienced the show. And that's really difficult to measure. So if you're going to invest a couple, $10 million in a television program, how are you going to measure your return on investment? Well, the people you are aiming for are six to nine years old. You're not going to see those benefits until really far down the line. And then it's hard to measure in a quantitative way. But I think you can point to the reach of the program to sort of see how far that is. But even more so, mean, the qualitative examples we're encountering in our research are enormous. We run into people all the time who say this was really core to their understanding, particularly girls and women for whom This show made them recognize that science was something they wanted to do as a career. So that's the kind of the personal impact and the impact on future scientists. The entertainment or the edutainment impact is also quite large. Magic School Bus was not the only show trying to do this sort of work. mean, there was this, there was conversation about a blizzard of wizards in the 1990s where there are all these new shows coming out. But it really served as a blueprint for a lot of enterprises that followed in a couple of ways. One as a multimedia enterprise. So it wasn't just that it was a show, it was really important that Scholastic and Microsoft and all of these companies were looking for multiple revenue streams, that this was an intellectual property. And that model, I think, is, you know, we just take for granted. now that concepts kind of go across media platforms. But the last thing I'll say about this is that the production model for the show became the blueprint for other shows after it. There was a show called Cyber Chase, for example. That's this animated series about math and computer science that was created by most of the team that worked on the Magic School Bus that is now still running in its 14th season, I believe.

Travis

Wow, I don't think I've ever seen Cyberchase. I know that we've started watching a new show called Skillsville on PBS. I don't know if you all have seen that.

Matt

So Cyberchase had Christopher Lloyd, you know, from Back to the Future as the main villain and Gilbert Gottfried was a key sidekick in it. So it was one of those that like right at the beginning of the 2000s was quite popular.

Travis

Wow, I need to go back and check that out. Well, Michael, I'm curious from maybe a communications, TV perspective, what are maybe some ripple effects when it comes to TV shows or specifically animated shows? Do we still see the impact of the Magic School Bus in that field as well?

Michael

Well, think, you know, definitely, you know, I think just tying into the, you know, match example of Cyberchase, mean, obviously, you know, because even with that production, it wasn't just, you know, the same writers, but, know, you know, one of the main directors for the Magic School Bus basically became the series director for Cyberchase. And so, you know, that kind of approach of, you know, animation and all that was carried forward as well. again, there's this idea of, you know, more and more shows that are trying to understand, you know, how we can use animation, you know, to help teach students. mean, with the Magic School Bus, it was PBS's first fully animated show. know, you look at, you know, Sesame Street, which had animation segments, right? I mean, we all can remember some of those like, the counting pinball machine ones and all that. But here was PBS's first all animated show, which then raised the question, yeah, of how do we blend entertainment and education at the same time? And so you continue having that kind of question moving forward. And I think one of the biggest examples of a ripple, if you want to think about the Magic School Bus, that the Magic School Bus. has already had one reboot on Netflix, right? So Magic School Bus rides again. And so I think, you know, there's this idea of like, there was again, something magical about the Magic School Bus and you still have, you know, executives, producers, writers who, you know, were part of that or who experienced that and are trying to like recapture it in different ways. And so I think that's another way we see like just that continuation. within the realm of television. It's just, yes, we see it in other shows, but in keeping that intellectual property alive as well, we see that ripple.

Travis

Yeah, well, it definitely seems to be the bus that just keeps on moving. If I can say that phrase here. I am curious, where would you all take the school bus? If you could take the school bus anywhere, where would you want to go?

Matt

Well, I'm a historian, so the obvious answer is back in time. And in fact, Joanna Cole, the original author of this series, I think played around with that idea some. And there's one episode of the television show that does go back in time in order to study the dinosaurs as well. yeah, I think that's my historian's answer.

Travis

Okay, is there a specific time period though? Just all of it? Okay. I've seen how that goes. I think a couple of guys in a phone booth did that once. Michael, what about for you?

Michael

I actually would say, think, going back to the prehistoric dinosaur days, it was a topic I was very much interested in as a kid. I remember there was kind two phases for me. was the dinosaurs and there was ancient Egypt. There used to be this little book that had stamps in it that you could do hieroglyphs and all that one of my key memories from school. So I think definitely maybe one or the other there. Yeah, because except for the dinosaur episode, at least in the TV series, we really don't explore too much going time travel. There's a little bit more of that in some of the later books. There's an Imperial China book that got created a little bit later that I kind of find interesting that they actually went in that direction there.

Matt

Having thought about it, you asked where would you go on the bus? And I think the thing about the Magic School Bus is in the narrative, it's a vehicle. It's almost not the thing that matters. What really mattered was that there was this diverse group of very, very different kids who all had really unique personalities who sometimes got along and sometimes got into fights with each other. And sometimes it was one of the kids in the classes, like time to shine in the narrative. And then other stories were about different kids. And having watched and read these books repeatedly, to me, what I would like is to just be in that kind of environment. And with Ms. Frizzle, you have this teacher whom You know, she doesn't necessarily have all the answers and then she kind of has all the answers and she's really good about getting you into trouble and letting you figure things out on your own. And so that experiential element of what the Magic School Bus was all about, I think speaks to more than anything else to its kind of magical ability.

Travis

Yeah, I think that's awesome. I guess I do have one one final question. Does anybody ever have to sign a permission slip to get on that bus? Is that they address that in the program?

Michael

No. Yeah, I mean, they never have to sign a permission slip and they, you know, there's visitors like, you know, Arnold's cousin joins them at times and, you know, so, yeah, it's...

Matt

They do go to great lengths to prevent their parents from knowing that this magic school bus exists.

Travis

I didn't actually know if there would be an answer to that, but I'm really glad that there was.

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Travis

And thanks to Matt and Michael for talking to us about the magic behind the Magic School Bus and its impact on both entertainment and science education. If you or someone you know would make for a great curious conversation, email me at traviskw at vt.edu. I'm Travis Williams and this has been Virginia Tech's Curious Conversations.

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