Thursday Workshops
- “Navigating Difficult Situations in Science Communication” (Engage)
Communication can get messy and audiences can surprise you. When that happens, it helps to be prepared. This workshop will help participants practice dealing with difficult situations in a safe setting, through discussions and improv exercises.
Engage is a graduate student-run organization at the UW. Engage runs an annual scicomm seminar, and holds workshops for interested groups. A study demonstrating Engage’s effectiveness is published in the Journal of Science Communication. - “Social Strategies for Climate Communication” (Richelle Tanner, Blair Bazdarich, and Sarah-Mae Nelson)
Communicating climate change research to the public is difficult! Learn strategies to make it easier using tested communication tactics based on shared societal values and mechanistic metaphors designed to promote climate engagement.
Dr. Richelle Tanner is a climate ecophysiologist at Washington State University and also works with the National Network for Ocean and Climate Change Interpretation. She strives to bridge research and communication within the scientific community. - “Engaging the Public with Social Media” (Mary Catherine Longshore, AAAS)
The Engaging the Public with Social Media module covers the latest research on use of social media, including why and how scientists can use it to engage, an introduction to using Twitter, and best practices for engaging in online conversations and using social media metrics. Participants identify their goal and audience, and develop sample tweets.
Mary Catherine Longshore is a public engagement senior program associate for the American Association for the Advancement of Science Center for Public Engagement with Science and Technology. She coordinates the Center’s Communicating Science workshops, working closely with workshop facilitators, and supports other Center programs. Prior to joining AAAS in 2016, Mary Catherine organized science communication workshops and connected scientists and journalists for the public information office at the American Geophysical Union. She has a Master’s degree in Journalism (Northeastern University) and a Bachelor’s degree in Applied Meteorology (Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University). She is a licensed commercial pilot. - “Don’t Just Talk Science, Help Them ‘Do’ Science” (Amanda Fisher and Lauren Moreno)
This session will empower participants to incorporate hands-on elements into all types of science communication. From large group lectures to virtual presentations and more, active engagement will improve your communication for all audiences!
Amanda Fisher and Lauren Moreno have a combined 28 years of experience in science communication and informal science education. This duo has collaborated with over a hundred individual scientists and engineers to design custom hands-on activities.
Friday Workshops
- “Using Science Communications to Chart a Course for Change” (COMPASS)
Your motivation for communicating science is to change the world. But how? In this mini-workshop, you’ll use the COMPASS Change Chart to identify and articulate your goals, a roadmap for achieving them, and explore roles for making change happen.
Estelle is a broadly-trained scientist with diverse experience in scicomm, as both a trainer and a practitioner. Her work with COMPASS focuses on building the science communication and science policy capacity of scientists throughout the western U.S. - “Overcoming Science Communication Misconceptions” (Kristen Weiss)
This workshop will promote discussion around some of recent concerns expressed by scientists about the role science communication should play in science, and present strategies for addressing these concerns and building the scicomm community.
Kristen Weiss is currently the Communications Coordinator for the Long-Term Ecological Research Network. She earned a PhD in science but her passion for sci-comm led her to become a professional science communicator over five years ago. - “Finding Your Identity in Science Communication” (Ben Young Landis and Kelly Tyrrell)
“What is it that you do again?” In this guided workshop, Ben Young Landis and Kelly Tyrrell will help scicomm pros reflect on their individual skills and vocational goals—creating a Strategy Document to help them navigate their identities and brands.
Kelly April Tyrrell and Ben Young Landis (Creative Externalities) are consultants with experiences and insights from institutions such as University of Wisconsin-Madison and U.S. Geological Survey. They are alumni of the AAAS Mass Media Fellowship. - “Fuzzy Reception: Transmitting Findings and Bias” (Kris Gowen and Rachel Crist)
Research passes through many gatekeepers, processes, & mediums before reaching audiences. We will examine this game of telephone that refracts findings through institutional & individual lenses, imparting biases & muddling the original science.
L. Kris Gowen, PhD, EdM is Director of Community Engaged Evaluation at OHSU. She has over 20 years of evaluation and research experience; much of her work focuses on youth and sexuality, where biases in research and reporting are rampant.
Expert Panels
PANEL 1 – “Identifying Sources of Misinformation and Taking Action”
This session addresses issues which are largely ignored in science communication training, yet which affect every communicator’s ability to reach their audience: who is spreading misinformation, how are they doing it, and how can we combat it?
- Featuring: Seth Lewis, David Shiffman, and Sarah Myhre (Moderator: Matt Wilkins)
PANEL 2 – “Building Public Trust in the Fake News Era”
To improve science literacy among our audiences, science communicators should also consider improving news literacy and regaining public trust in the media. In this session, we’ll discuss media literacy and ways to integrate it into the work we do.
- Featuring: Jennifer Cutraro, Monica Feliu-Mojer, and Kelly Tyrrell (Moderator: Russ Campbell)
