New UA Effort Focuses on Talking Science Without the Science Talk

New UA Effort Focuses on Talking Science Without the Science Talk

By Daniel StolteUniversity Relations, Communications
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In the Science Café Series, hosted by the UA College of Science, graduate students share their research with the public in an informal setting.
In the Science Café Series, hosted by the UA College of Science, graduate students share their research with the public in an informal setting.

From designing the world's largest and most advanced telescope mirrors to pioneering new advances to improve human health, the UA is at the forefront of advancing science and technology. With science becoming ever more complex and scientific discoveries happening at a faster pace comes the challenge of sharing those advances with the public. As finding funding for scientific research has become more competitive, increasingly funding agencies require concrete efforts to share research with audiences other than colleagues working in the same field or discipline. 

A new, campus community-driven initiative has been launched to enhance the UA's capabilities in science communication. Earlier this month, a group of more than 40 people, including campus researchers, instructors and communicators – all of whom shared a common interest in finding new ways and expanding on existing ones to communicate UA science – met to launch an effort to better share UA scientific activities and discoveries with people outside of the scientific community.

"Our immediate goal was to start a conversation and keep it going," said Elliott Cheu, a professor of physics and the associate dean of the College of Science, who co-hosted the gathering with Christopher Cokinos, an associate professor who directs the Creative Writing MFA program in the Department of English. "Our ultimate goal is to match the UA's caliber in science with the same caliber in science communication."

Cokinos is affiliated with the UA Institute of the Environment and involved with the Carson Scholar program, which supports doctoral students in the environmental sciences and places a strong emphasis on communicating science to a broad audience. He also was part of the first cohort training at the Alan Alda Center for Communicating Science at Stony Brook University before joining the UA in 2011.

"As someone who writes about nature and science, I have interviewed many people," Cokinos said, "and I came to appreciate those who are able to convey their work in a way I can understand. Since coming to the UA, I have met several people involved in science communication, and I wanted to get these people in a room and get them talk to each other."

The organizers said they envision the initiative as a campuswide conversation, and all are welcome to provide input.

"We feel this effort needs to be driven by everybody, from administrative staff to communicators and faculty members," Cokinos said. "We have the capacity to train students and faculty to communicate their research, and with a sense of community and networking, we can do this."

Working in self-assigned focus groups, participants shared their thoughts and proposed ideas to develop science communication through four pillars.

Curriculum
Participants discussed enhancing opportunities for UA students to engage in science communication and increasing diversity and multilingual resources in this area. They also discussed incorporating science communication as part of the UA's 100% Engagement initiative, inviting speakers to campus and including students in the development of games, apps, blogs, multimedia, podcasts and websites. They discussed producing a white paper with concrete suggestions and a timeline to accomplish those goals.

Certificate program
Participants discussed developing a formal professional training program for UA science communicators.

Faculty development
This focus group discussed providing UA faculty with resources and training opportunities in communicating their research to the media and the public. Some ideas included science communication workshops, media trainings, a visiting or resident journalism program, or topic-driven brown-bag seminars.

Kevin Bonine, director of education and outreach at Biosphere 2, said he has committed a portion of his Agnese Nelms Haury Fellowship in Environment and Social Justice toward the cost of hosting a half-day workshop, run by an expert of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), for up to 50 UA scientists.

"We are working on the details and securing remaining funds but hope to be able to offer it in September," Bonine said. "Topics are potentially many, but especially valuable are tailoring messages for different audiences, multimedia fluency and peer feedback."

Science Communication Center
Participants envisioned a center, or an "institute without walls," that serves as a hub and resource center to foster science communication efforts at the UA.

Already, the University offers a range of successful outreach initiatives to share its research with the public. Examples include the hugely popular annual College of Science Lecture Series, the Downtown Lecture Series, Science Cafes, a semi-annual special insert in the Arizona Daily Star and public programs featuring UA research at the Flandrau Science Center and Planetarium, as well as programs at Biosphere 2, which draw more than 100,000 visitors each year.  

"Those are just some of the local outlets we have," Cheu said. "There are multiple other venues where we are communicating with the general public. We believe the University has the potential to become a national player in science communication."

One of the goals in the push for more science communication is to convince researchers that learning how to effectively communicate with audiences outside the scientific community is time well spent. One participant mentioned the example of the National Science Foundation refusing to even consider a science grant proposal from a Nobel laureate because the applicant hadn't bothered to state the broader impact of the proposed work.

"This gathering clearly showed that faculty from a diverse set of disciplines have the passion and desire to develop a sustainable and comprehensive UA program to better communicate our science to our students, stakeholders in our local community and to the general public," said Ed Prather, a professor in the Department of Astronomy. "It was very helpful to see how different instructors are being creative with their teaching to ensure that the next generation of students is equipped with the knowledge and tools to engage in all aspects of communicating science, whether it be through the media, in their workplace or the classroom."

Cokinos said: "We realized there is enough energy to get something going, but we really are just starting the process. If there is buy-in, if people want to make this happen, we can be a world leader in science communication."

For more information or to get involved, contact Elliott Cheu at echeu@email.arizona.edu or Christopher Cokinos at cokinos@email.arizona.edu.

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