At a storefront space in northwest Bend over the weekend, children with caretakers in tow streamed in to explore stations dedicated to science and art. The adults mostly watched from the sidelines as the kids took over the space. No corrections or warnings of ‘don’t touch’ were needed.

Nine-year-old Jack Segal carefully cut strips of paper into tiny pieces before scooping the small mountain of scraps and heading across the room toward a large plastic tunnel with a fan at one end.

He dropped his paper mountain into the tube and turned on the fan, blasting paper snow out of the wind tunnel and onto his little brother, who erupted into giggles.

In another corner of the room, Kora Neil, 7, precariously balanced green foam blocks, building a tower higher than her head.

This was the first weekend of a month-long, indoor, pop-up of the Central Oregon Children’s Museum. Since 2024, the emerging museum has been on wheels – traversing thousands of miles across the region at over a hundred events. The goal is to engage kids with science, technology, engineering and art, or STEAM learning.

The museum’s Sunday event, its first in a brick-and-mortar building, was a sign of changes to come.

On Wednesday, the team behind the museum announced it had secured a permanent home in a different space in Bend’s growing Central District. Along with the location comes a new name: “Ruckus: A Children’s Science Museum.”

Construction of the museum’s exhibits in the nearly 8,000-square-foot building is set to begin next year, while the opening date is unclear.

Organizers started the mobile events in 2015, but the momentum of those early years was cut short when the COVID-19 pandemic hit in 2020. That year, the Portland Children’s Museum closed its doors and has yet to reopen.

Bend is currently the only metropolitan region in Oregon that does not have a dedicated children’s or science museum, said Erica Segal, the museum’s director. While there are other institutions attuned toward natural history and youth programming, like the High Desert Museum, Segal said Ruckus will fill a significant gap.

“We are unique in that we are one hundred percent intentionally a space built for kids. There will be no ‘Please don’t touch’ signs in our museum.”

The museum also comes at a time when children in the region are struggling with proficiency in STEAM categories.

Only 1 in 4 students in Central Oregon are proficient in science, according to the museum organizers’ analysis of Oregon Department of Education data, which also found that by state metrics, fewer than 1 in 3 students in the region are considered proficient in math.

Creating opportunities outside of the classroom to explore STEAM concepts in a hands-on environment is key to early intervention, according to Segal.

After two years on the road and meeting tens of thousands of people at pop-up events, she said the team has seen the need firsthand. At every event, she said she gets asked the same two questions: “Where are you located?” And, “When are you opening?”

The permanent museum is designed for elementary-aged children with three core exhibit zones that play off the natural landscape of the region. A computer rendering of the proposed space features a topographical sound table, rock hounding zone and a vertical lookout tower for children to climb.

Ryan Neil, a father who lives in Bend, visited the Sunday pop-up event. He has been taking his daughter to museum events around town all year. Between adding stories to a wooden block house with his daughter, Neil talked about how much his family has enjoyed the events and how needed a permanent space is in a region booming with population growth.

“I think it’s great,” said Neil. “It seems like with Bend getting bigger, there’ll probably be more people willing to support them financially and it’ll get more popular.”

The museum started fundraising to meet its $3 million goal last month. So far they’ve raised about $450,000, according to Segal.

News Source : https://www.opb.org/article/2026/10/14/central-oregon-kids-museum-bend/