This NSF INCUDES Design and Development Launch Pilot will increase the recruitment, retention, and matriculation of racial and ethnic minorities in STEM Ph.D. programs contributing to hazards and disaster research. Increasing STEM focused minorities on hazards mitigation, and disaster research areas will benefit society and contribute to the achievements of specific, desired societal outcomes following disasters. The Minority SURGE Capacity in Disasters (SURGE) launch pilot will provide the empirical research to identify substantial ways to increase the underrepresentation of minorities in STEM disciplines interested in hazards mitigation and disaster research. Increasing the involvement of qualified minorities will help solve the broader vulnerability concerns in these communities and help advance the body of knowledge through the diversity of thought and creative problem solving in scholarship and practice. Utilizing workshops and a multifaceted mentorship program SURGE creates a new model that addresses the diversity concerns in both STEM and disaster fields, and make American communities more resilient following natural disasters. This project will be of interest to policymakers, educators and the general public.
The Minority SURGE Capacity in Disasters (SURGE) NSF INCLUDES Design and Development Launch Pilot will enhance the social capital of racial and ethnic minority communities by increasing their networks, connections, and access to disaster management decision-making among members of their community from STEM fields. The four-fold goals of SURGE are to: (1) increase the number of minority graduate researchers in STEM fields with a disaster focus; (2) develop and guide well-trained, qualified disaster scholars from STEM fields; (3) provide academic and professional mentorship for next generation minority STEM scholars in hazards mitigation and disaster research; and (4) develop professional and research opportunities that involve outreach and problem solving for vulnerable communities in the U.S. The SURGE project is organized as a lead-organization network through the University of Nebraska at Omaha and includes community partners. As a pilot project, SURGE participation is limited to graduate students from research-intensive universities across the country. Each student will attend workshops and training programs developed by the project leads. SURGE investigators will conduct project evaluation and assessment of their workshops, training, and mentorship projects. Results from evaluations and assessments will be presented at STEM and disaster-related conferences and published in peer-reviewed academic journals.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
DeeDee BennettLori PeekTerri NortonHans Louis-Charles
resourceprojectProfessional Development, Conferences, and Networks
The Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research (INSTAAR) at the University of Colorado, Boulder, in collaboration with EcoArts Connections and the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), is conducting an initial planning workshop and related activities which will be the first of three stepwise convenings over the next two or three years to gather experts from the fields of natural and social sciences, arts, energy/water conservation, and related disciplines. The initiative will work to establish an operational strategy for knowledge sharing across collaborating entities, networks, and associations. The major goal is to strengthen collaboration of professionals nationally to better conceive, conduct, and evaluate projects for the public that work at the intersection of science, arts, and sustainability (environmental, social and economic). Many communities around the country have been seeking to address increasingly pressing problems about their ability to sustain the vitality, health and resilience of their regions and the lives of their residents. Bringing inter-disciplinary knowledge and skills to bear on these issues is considered to be critical. Between 24 - 32 professionals will be involved. The workshop will be conducted simultaneously in Boulder, CO and at Princeton University, with communication between the two sites. This project is funded by the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program, which seeks to advance new approaches to, and evidence-based understanding of, the design and development of STEM learning in informal environments. This includes providing multiple pathways for broadening access to and engagement in STEM learning experiences, advancing innovative research on and assessment of STEM learning in informal environments, and developing understandings of deeper learning by participants. Intended outcomes from this first workshop include: 1) identification and preliminary mapping of successful evidence-based best practices in science-arts-sustainability collaborations 2) a strategic vision for interdisciplinary collaboration across networks; and 3) an initial framework for the dissemination of findings that can reach across disciplines. Outputs include 1) preparation of a pre-workshop briefing booklet based in part on interviews of professionals in the various disciplines; 2) a post-workshop white paper; 3) a network of experts from the participating disciplinary fields; and 4) an agenda for the second (larger) convening. The trans-disciplinary strategy promises to more efficiently and effectively bring STEM disciplines to a wider public in collaboration with the arts through sustainability topics that are place-based, targeted to, and meaningful for specific audiences.
The Anthropologist examines climate change like no other film before. The fate of the planet is considered from the perspective of American teenager Katie Crate. Over the course of five years, she travels alongside her mother Susie, an anthropologist studying the impact of climate change on indigenous communities. Their journey parallels that of renowned anthropologist Margaret Mead, who for decades sought to understand how global change affects remote cultures.
From January 2012 to May 2012, SmartStart Educational Consulting Services conducted a front-end evaluation of the documentary
This article provides a starting position and scene-setter for an invited commentary series on science communication and public intellectualism. It begins by briefly considering what intellectualism and public intellectualism are, before discussing their relationship with science communication, especially in academia. It ends with a call to science communication academics and practitioners to either become more active in challenging the status quo, or to help support those who wish to by engendering a professional environment that encourages risk-taking and speaking-out in public about
This paper describes evidence suggesting that science curiosity counteracts politically biased information processing. This finding is in tension with two bodies of research. The first casts doubt on the existence of “curiosity” as a measurable disposition. The other suggests that individual differences in cognition related to science comprehension - of which science curiosity, if it exists, would presumably be one - do not mitigate politically biased information processing but instead aggravate it. The paper describes the scale-development strategy employed to overcome the problems associated
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Dan KahanAsheley LandrumKatie CarpenterLaura HelftKathleen Hall Jamieson
As part of its overall strategy to enhance learning in informal environments, the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program funds innovative resources for use in a variety of settings. This proposed effort embraces broad participation by the three Ute tribes, History Colorado, and scientists in the field of archaeology to investigate and integrate traditional ecological knowledge and contemporary Western science. The project will preserve knowledge from the Ute peoples of Colorado and Utah, including traditional technology, ethnobotany, engineering and math. Results from this project will inform educational efforts in similar communities.
This project will build on the long-standing collaborations between History Colorado (HC), the Southern Ute Indian Tribe, Ute Mountain Ute Tribe and Ute Indian Tribe, Uintah & Ouray Reservation, and the Dominguez Archaeological Research Group DARG). HC will implement and evaluate a regional informal learning collaboration focused on Ute traditional and contemporary STEM knowledge serving over 128,000 learners through tribal programs, local history museums and educational networks. This project will advance the understanding of integrated knowledge and the role of Ute people as STEM learners and practitioners. This Informal Science Learning project will increase lifelong STEM learning in rural communities and create a replicable model for collaboration among tribes, history museums, and scientists.
There is broad consensus in the international scientific community that the world is facing a biodiversity crisis — the accelerated loss of life on Earth brought about by human activity. Threats to biodiversity have been variously classified by different authors (Diamond 1989, Laverty and Sterling 2004, Brook et al. 2008), but typically include ecosystem loss and fragmentation, unsustainable use, invasive species, pollution, and climate change. Across the globe, traditional and indigenous cultures are affected by many of the same threats affecting biological diversity, including the
The letter compares and contrasts thinking about making science accessible and relevant to children in science centres and museums with thinking about communication in social history museums.
The use of photography in the field of psychiatry is an eloquent example of the complex evolution of the relationship between science, communication and society. The research that follows analyses the development of such a relationship in a crucial period of the history of psychiatry: the 1970s. That was the time that witnessed the revolution of a science which admitted the failure of its methods and "instruments", mental hospitals. That was also the time when a profound change took place in the communicative methods of photography related to this uncertain field of knowledge. A group of
Enrico Fermi's work gave birth to a real cultural revolution in the Italian scientific scenario. His scientific studies concerned almost every field in physics and had far-reaching effects of which virtually everybody, above all in Italy, is still taking advantage. Two important "by-products" of Fermi's ideas and initiatives will be here taken into consideration: the new way of carrying out research and communicating science invented by Fermi and his group and his publications for the general public, which often stood for high examples of scientific popularisation. Then the focus will shift on
To provide feedback during the development of a second series for “Journey to Planet Earth,” an evaluation of one finished program in the first series was carried out with two different samples: an adult PBS-viewer sample and a upper middle school sample. The former sample represents the traditional audience for an environmental series. The latter sample was included to explore how the video series appeals to and is understood by the age group for which the outreach efforts are planned. The general goals for the research were as follows:
• reaction to the program overall with respect to
The “Impressions from a Lost World” website and related public programs will tell the story of the 19th century discovery of dinosaur tracks along the Connecticut River Valley in Massachusetts and Connecticut. The significance of these fossils extended far beyond the emerging scientific community, as they exerted a profound effect upon American arts, religion, and culture that reverberates down to the present day. The website will use stories of real people to engage visitors to think about relationships between science and religion, amateur vs. professional scientific pursuits and the role of specialization, participation of women in science, and the impact of new scientific ideas on American culture. Website visitors will draw connections of these important humanities themes to current issues. Accompanying public programs will attract diverse audiences and build interest in the website.