Perspectives

This is not a blog. It is a place for considered writing on leadership, institutions, and the work of building organizations that serve the public interest. Nicholas publishes a small number of pieces each year, reflections drawn from direct experience, not commentary from the sidelines.

What We Owe the Next Generation of Curious Kids

There is a building in every major city that exists for one purpose: to make a child curious. Science centres, discovery museums, planetariums, these are public infrastructure, not tourist attractions. They sit at the intersection of education, culture, and civic identity. They are where a seven-year-old touches a real fossil for the first time, or watches electricity arc across a gap, or asks a question no one in the family has thought to ask before. I have a young child, and I think about this often, about wonder as a public good, about what happens when we invest in it and what we lose when we do not. This is the first in an occasional series on institutions, leadership, and the things that matter most when no one is watching.