CoCoRaHS (The Community Collaborative Rain, Hail and Snow Network) is a citizen science program where thousands of volunteers across the entire country measure and report the amount of precipitation that falls each day in their own neighborhood (see http:www.cocorahs.org). In the next three years CoCoRaHS will use strategies from the "Citizen Science Toolkit" and align activities to the "Essential Principles to Climate Science" to engage thousands more participants in collecting, reporting and exploring precipitation. Evapotranspiration measurements will be added to better teach and demonstrate the hydrologic cycle in action. Through strong NOAA partnerships with the National Weather Service, the National Climatic Data Center, the Earth Systems Research Lab and the National Operational Hydrologic Remote Sensing Center, precipitation data quality and accessibility for professional users will be enhanced. The CoCoRaHS network will be constructing training, data entry and visualization tools utilizing Web 2.0 concepts, cyberlearning tools and hand-held device applications with a goal of increasing participation and expanding the current volunteer network into broader, younger, more diverse and more interactive audiences.
In the project entitled "The GLOBE Program 2010: Collaborative Environmental Research at Local to Global Scales," the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR) will improve the functionality of the GLOBE Program by providing: (1) new methods, tools, and services to enhance GLOBE Partner and teacher abilities to facilitate inquiry-based learning and student research, (2) initial pilot testing and assessment of student and teacher learning activities and events related to Climate Science research, (3) improvements in GLOBE's technology infrastructure and data systems (e.g. database, social networking, information management) to support collaborations between students, scientists, and teachers, and (4) development of a robust evaluation plan. In addition, the UCAR will continue to provide support to the worldwide GLOBE community, as well as program management and timely communication with program sponsors.
This project will expand and enhance an initiative that offers zoos, aquariums, and science museums the market research they need to engage and motivate the public on issues related to the ocean and climate change. The three-year project will measure changes in public awareness and action on ocean and climate-related issues. It will integrate these research findings into recommendations offered to staff working at zoos, aquariums, and science museums as well as to the ocean conservation community and provide professional development for staff members at these institutions in order to support and shape public outreach efforts that connect climate change, the ocean and individual actions, especially among our nation's youth.
This proposed Communicating Research to Public Audiences (CRPA) project outlines a pathway for communicating how climate change can affect a watershed area that supplies water for a specific region. The educational platforms will address the geology of the Caldera along with meteorology, ecology and hydrology. The project will focus on the ongoing scientific research processes and the impact of climate change to the physical system as well as to the citizens who depend on this resource. Partners in this endeavor include New Mexico EPSCOR, the University of New Mexico, the Valles Caldera National Preserve, the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science, Santa Fe Productions and Tim Aydelott Productions. The project team will create a PBS television documentary in English and Spanish, including a Native American Jemez Pueblo storyteller who will describe the natural environment of the Caldera. The team will also create a YouTube channel with updatable clips, a Facebook fan page, and a climate change exhibit. The evaluation will include front-end and summative components, and will be conducted by Minnick & Associates and Elsa Bailey Consulting. The intended impact of this CRPA is to educate the public about the importance of the Caldera in securing the region's water supply and how climate changes could impact their lives. Further, aspects of the multidisciplinary science used in this research will be described with the goal of encouraging more young people from the region to choose STEM careers.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
William MichenerAnthony Tiano
resourceprojectProfessional Development, Conferences, and Networks
Earth to Sky (ETS) is an exciting, growing partnership between the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the National Park Service (NPS) the US Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), and the University of California, Berkeley. Together we work to enable and encourage informal educators to access and use relevant NASA and other science, data, and educational products in their work. The project is co-lead by NASA Earth Science Education, in partnership with NPS, USFWS and U.C. Berkeley. Earth to Sky has been funded by a series of NASA grants and the Earth Science Division of NASA's Science Mission Directorate. Mission Statement: Actively foster collaborative work between the science and interpretation/education communities of NPS, USFWS and NASA, to ultimately enrich the experiences of millions of visitors to America’s National Parks, Refuges and other protected areas. There are two, closely linked components to ETS: Professional Development, and an active Community of Practice. We use a collaborative approach to interagency professional development, bringing scientists and educators together in collegial learning environments. Our training events emphasize development of plans for use of course content in participants’ work environment. We provide face-to-face, distance-learning and blended learning opportunities. Since 2008 the effort has focused on climate change science and communication. However, we maintain connections with other science content areas, including comparative planetology and the Sun-Earth connection. We have also developed, and continue to nurture and expand, a community of practice that uses the science and communication skills and capabilities of each of the partners to enrich public engagement in natural and cultural heritage sites across the United States. Impact: 86 course participants from a total of 3 ETS courses have in turn reached well over 4 million visitors to parks and refuges with content derived from ETS professional development. Archives of almost all ETS presentations and examples of participants’ work are available to registered members of our website http://www.earthtosky.org Registration is free and open to anyone with an interest in science communication. We also maintain a listserv of nearly 500 individuals, which provides periodic updates on science, professional development opportunities and other news of relevance to the community.
The Civilians, Inc., a theatre company in Brooklyn, NY, is producing The Great Immensity, a touring play with songs and video that explores our relationship to the environment, with a focus on critical issues of climate change and biodiversity conservation. The play has been created with a network of partners including the Princeton Environmental Institute and Princeton Atelier Program/Lewis Arts Center, which will maintain an ongoing relationship with the project. The play uses real places and stories drawn from interviews conducted by the artists to create an experience that is part investigative journalism and part inventive theater. Attendance at the performances is projected to be about 75,000. A major goal of the project is to help the public better appreciate how science studies the Earth's biosphere and to promote an inquisitive curiosity about our place in the natural world. The initiative also intends to create and evaluate a new model for how theater can increase public awareness, knowledge, and engagement with important science-related societal issues. Project deliverables include the development and testing of online content, podcasts, and videos as well as special community education and outreach efforts in each community where the play is staged. Performances will be accompanied by post-performance panel discussions with the artists, local scientists and policy makers. After the completion of the initial tour, the play will be published, licensed, and made available to other theaters to produce independently.
"Genes to Ecosystems" is a Communicating Research to Public Audiences (CRPA) proposal based upon the Dr. Thomas Whitham's NSF funded research (#0425908 "Frontiers in Integrative Biological Research (FBIR): Ecological Genomics and Heritability: Consequences of Extended Phenotypes"). "Genes to Ecosystems" has two main educational objectives: to introduce a wide sector of the public to new ways of looking at ecosystems, and to show how science happens, with practical outcomes that are meaningful to the public. The CRPA request will support the production of a one-hour documentary film, podcasts, a stand-alone DVD, and radio segments for "Earth Notes." These deliverables are targeted to informal learners and public television viewers in the western United States. The documentary will follow a research project begun in 1982 which demonstrates how genetic variation within a foundation species--in this case cottonwood trees--impacts community members ranging from microbes to mega-fauna. The concept of genes-to-ecosystems has introduced new ways of understanding ecosystems which have practical implications for conserving biodiversity, ecological restoration, coping with climate change, and other public policy issues. The project will be managed by the PI, Dr. Thomas Whitham, and co-PI, Daniel Boone, both at Northern Arizona University.
The purpose of this three-year collaborative design research project is to examine the role of culture in the development of knowledge and reasoning about the natural world and the subsequent sense-making of and participation in natural resource management. The PIs propose to examine the ways in which culture impacts observational habits, explanation constructing, uses and forms of evidence, and orientations towards socio-scientific challenges such as natural resource management. Collaborating on this project are researchers from the American Indian Center of Chicago, Northwestern University, and the Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin. The audience for this study includes the academic informal science education community and indigenous science educators. This project also offers extensive cross-cultural, cross-disciplinary research opportunities for pre- and post-doctoral research trainees. The project will employ a mixed methods approach and proposes evaluation through an advisory board and community input. A community assessment team is proposed to review activities, obtain feedback from the larger community, and identify challenges to the effective implementation of the program. The project is comprised of two main panels of studies: the first consisting of a series of investigations of learning in everyday activities and the second consisting of two community design experiments that engage two Native American communities and two non-Native communities, one rural and one urban for both communities, in a culturally based citizen science (CBCS) project focused on ecosystem disruption (e.g. invasive species; climate change) and natural resource management. The CBCS project will engage participants in question formation, data collection, data analysis, forming policy recommendations, and citizen action around the findings. This project will develop a citizen science model that effectively engages diverse communities towards productive science learning, helpful scientific data collection, and citizen engagement in community planning and local policy decisions. The researchers believe that fundamental advances in STEM teaching and learning are needed across the broad landscape of learning environments and that the success of such advances may pivot on innovations and discoveries made in informal environments. Insights obtained from prior research on learning in indigenous cultures, especially in biological and environmental sciences, combined with the anticipated results from this study could lead to a deeper understanding of cross-cultural similarities and differences in science learning.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Karen WashinawatokMegan BangDouglas MedinUniversity of Washington
The Change (working title) is a film project with supporting website and resource materials to document how climate change is impacting indigenous peoples in the most climate sensitive regions, and how anthropologists, environmental scientists, engineers, and others are working with these communities to help mitigate the effects. The documentary features Dr. Susie Crate, an NSF-funded anthropologist, and her bi-national teenage daughter Katie, whose father is from Siberia. The Viliui Sahka in Siberia, Alaska Natives in Nome, and South Pacific Islanders on Tuvalu are the communities portrayed in the film. The Change is a Full-Scale Development project produced by Ironbound Films. Outreach partners include the Center for Climate Change Communication (4C) at George Mason University, the Global Climate Adaptation Partnership (GCAP), the Society for Applied Anthropology (SfAA), the International Indian Treaty Council (IITC), and the Institute for Tribal Environmental Professionals (ITEP). Ironbound Films has designed this project to build upon its successful prior documentary work, The Linguists. Deliverables include a documentary for limited theatrical release and television and Internet broadcast along with an interactive website, curriculum guide, a shorter classroom version of the film, and a robust outreach strategy in collaboration with project partners. One of the components of the outreach in conjunction with SfAA will be to create the first social networking site around climate change adaptation. Another in conjunction with GCAP is to create a series of four virtual climate change tours for Google Maps and Earth applications. SmartStart Educational Consulting Services will conduct front-end, formative, and summative evaluations. The real-life characters and communities featured in the film will illustrate how climate change is affecting people today in various parts of the world. The project gives voice to anthropologists who have been working to understand climate change as a cultural phenomenon, a perspective rarely showcased in the media. Anthropologists have expressed the need for an effective means to share this work and its results with the public. The story is based on contemporary climate science and anthropology, but features the personal perspective of the bi-national teenage daughter, and is intended to appeal to an audience not typically drawn to a climate change documentary, especially the young or underserved. An aggressive, targeted marketing and outreach campaign reflects the film's innovative approach.
TERC and the Girl Scouts of Eastern Massachusetts are partnering to create an energy monitoring and conservation afterschool program for approximately 5,500 girls ages 8-11 in eastern Massachusetts. The goals of the Girls Energy Conservation Corps (GECCo) project are to involve girls in learning and applying science, using technology, developing leadership and communication skills, educating peers, saving energy, and addressing the global issue of climate change. The project is (1) developing activity-based Guides to help girls understand, monitor, and reduce energy use, (2) understand the connection between their own energy consumption and climate change, and (3) setting goals to cumulatively reduce their energy consumption.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Gillian PuttickJoan ReillyBrian DraytonKatherine LeLacheur
resourceprojectProfessional Development, Conferences, and Networks
"Saving Species" will engage large and diverse public audiences in inquiry-based learning and environmental stewardship through a system of exhibits at zoos and other informal science education institutions throughout the U.S. The exhibit system will include more than 70 touch screen interactives and related technological infrastructure being created by Project Dragonfly at Miami University (Ohio). Project partners include the Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden, Brookfield Zoo, Cleveland Metroparks Zoo, Columbus Zoo & Aquarium, Denver Zoo, Liberty Science Center, Louisville Zoological Garden, New York State Zoo, Oregon Zoo, Pittsburgh Zoo, Riverbanks Zoo, Santa Barbara Zoo, Shedd Aquarium, Toledo Zoo, The Wilds, Woodland Park Zoo, and Zoo Atlanta. Touch screen exhibit components will be designed for specific programs at partner zoos. The partner institutions in this consortium are establishing exhibits nationwide linked to one of three Saving Species campaigns: 1) the Great Ape Campaign allows families to conduct research on captive ape populations and to help save wild apes by joining the work of experienced field researchers; 2) the Wild Cat Campaign focuses on endangered cat species and allows families to join in conservation efforts along with professionals; 3) the Sustaining Life Campaign builds on widespread interest and growing exhibitry in environmental stewardship, renewable energy, and climate change. The consortium includes a shared library of public inquiry and public-action tools (e.g., cell phone recycling), as well as remote monitoring capabilities that provide real-time measures of station success, facilitating the development of variations of exhibit interactives across the country. More than 500 staff from informal science institutions are participating in "Saving Species" professional development through workshops and graduate courses in major cities and conservation sites worldwide. The formal educational opportunities include two new Master\'s degree programs co-delivered by Miami University and informal science institutions: (1) the Advanced Inquiry Program, and (2) the Global Field Program. Strategic partners include the Association of Zoos & Aquariums, public television, Conservation International, and the Society of Conservation Biology. Project evaluation by the Institute for Learning Innovation includes specific assessment protocols that are identifying patterns of engagement by gender, ethnicity, and socio-economic class so that disparities can be addressed across these demographics. A planning study and front-end evaluation will inform the future development of personalized, post-visit engagement opportunities on social networking platforms. "Saving Species" will achieve broad impact nationally, reaching millions of visitors to the participating institutions annually during the funding period and beyond, fostering the relationship between science inquiry and public action, and building multi-institutional partnerships committed to sustaining life on our planet.
WGBH is producing the fifth and sixth seasons of NOVA scienceNOW, a multimedia project that addresses a wide array of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics subjects via multiple platforms. They include national PBS broadcast, the PBS web site, and innovative outreach activities such as an expanded Science Café initiative. Hosted by astrophysicist Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson, Season Five will air in 2010; Season Six in 2011. The focus is "stories of transformative research," e.g., nanotechnology, stem cells, quantum computing, as well as clean energy, and climate change. Project goals are to "produce a lasting impact on Americans' appreciation for and understanding of current scientific research," and to encourage an interest in STEM careers among younger viewers. Building upon solid prior work, the proposed project is finding new ways to interweave the television show, web materials, and Science Cafés to provide multiple entry points and pathways for the audience. For example, they will produce 32 web-only scientist profiles supported by a blog and social media tools, and then train these scientists as presenters for the Science Cafés. NOVA is planning a new strategy to maximize carriage and increase audience for the six new programs per year; the programs will run consecutively in the NOVA Wednesday evening primetime slot during the summer. During Season Three, over 2.7 million television viewers per week tuned in NOVA scienceNow, with 62,000 unique visitors to the web site per month and 75 active Science Cafés across the country. The expanded Science Café initiative is designed to become self-sustaining beyond the grant period through new partnerships with groups such as the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, the American Chemical Society, and the Coalition for the Public Understanding of Science. The project will also collaborate with the Association of Science-Technology Centers and science centers around the country to host Science Cafés featuring scientists profiled on the web. Goodman Research Group will assess the reach and effectiveness of Seasons Five and Six. The focal/primary evaluation activity is a viewing and engagement study on the influence of viewing the series along with accessing and participating actively with the increased web and outreach offerings. This study will comprise web-based surveys with adaptive branching patterns, which will include data collection from a variety of participants and will focus on participants? use of the series, website, and outreach. The summative evaluation will measure how the project is reaching these audience segments, while also meeting the overall goals of increasing public understanding of science and engagement in science-related activities.