The characteristics of interaction and dialogue implicit in the Web 2.0 have given rise to a new scenario in the relationship between science and society. The aim of this paper is the development of an evaluation tool scientifically validated by the Delphi method that permits the study of Internet usage and its effectiveness for encouraging public engagement in the scientific process. Thirty four indicators have been identified, structured into 6 interrelated criteria conceived for compiling data that help to explain the role of the Internet in favouring public engagement in science.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Lourdes LopezMaria Dolores Olvera-Lobo
Participants in this study reported a variety of resources used in the past to learn to code in Apex, including online tutorials, one-day classes sponsored by Salesforce, and meet-up groups focused on learning. They reported various difficulties in learning through these resources, including what they viewed as the gendered nature of classes where the men already seemed to know how to code—which set a fast pace for the class, difficulty in knowing “where to start” in their learning, and a lack of time to practice learning due to work and family responsibilities. The Coaching and Learning Group
This study examines the relative efficacy of citizen science recruitment messages appealing to four motivations that were derived from previous research on motives for participation in citizen-science projects. We report on an experiment (N=36,513) that compared the response to email messages designed to appeal to these four motives for participation. We found that the messages appealing to the possibility of contributing to science and learning about science attracted more attention than did one about helping scientists but that one about helping scientists generated more initial
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Tae Kyoung LeeKevin CrowstonMahboobeh HarandiCarsten ØsterlundGrant Miller
Growing Beyond Earth (GBE) is Fairchild’s NASA-funded classroom science project designed to advance research on growing plants aboard spacecraft. As NASA looks toward a long term human presence beyond Earth orbit, there are specific science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) challenges related to food production. GBE is addressing those challenges by expanding the diversity and quality of edible plants that can be grown in space. On Earth, GBE is also improving technologies for gardening in urban, indoor, and other resource-limited settings.
GBE is unique in its focus on real
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Marion LitzingerCatherine RaymondCarl LewisAmy Padolf
This zine summarizes the book "Equity, Exclusion and Everyday Science Learning." It provides an accessible graphic introduction to how inequalities in everyday science learning happen, so that we can get to a place where everyday science learning practices could disrupt and transform social inequities rather than reproducing them.
Feminist technoscience theory offers perspectives for science communication that both question common narratives and suggests new narratives. These perspectives emphasize issues of ethics and care often missing from science communication. They focus on questions of what is marginalized or left out of stories about science — and encourage us to make those absences visible.
This commentary introduces feminist standpoint theory and discusses its potential value in science communication. It offers two ways in which feminist standpoints can help in both research and practice. First, science communicators should aim to understand the perspective from which they understand and share scientific knowledge. Second, practitioners and researchers alike should seek insights from marginalized groups to help inform the ways the dominant view of science reflects hegemonic social and cultural norms.
This handout was prepared for the Climate Change Showcase at the 2019 ASTC Conference in Toronto, Ontario. It highlights resources available on InformalScience.org related to the topic of climate change.
In this poster, the Center for Research on Lifelong STEM Learning shared lessons learned from a study that used audio and video data from GoPros to investigate the entry characteristics of zoo and aquarium visitors and how those characteristics played out in terms of decision-making behaviors and meaning-making talk during a visit.
One way to motivate young people from diverse backgrounds to pursue engineering careers is to enlist them as educators who can help the general public understand how engineers help respond to the challenges of everyday life. The New York Hall of Science, which serves a large and diverse audience, is an ideal setting for testing the promise of this strategy. Youth educators and curators of public programs at the Hall of Science will mentor two groups of high school- and early college-aged youth, who will contribute to the design and facilitation of engineering-focused events and activities for museum visitors. They will work together to develop engineering programming for the public that emphasizes the cultural and interpersonal dimensions of engineering practices. This group of young people will be recruited from the Hall of Science's more than 100 Explainers, a very diverse group of young people who work part-time at the Hall of Science and engage with visitors as they explore the museum. Researchers will track participants' experiences and document their impact on museum visitors' perceptions of engineering. The expectation is that creating and delivering these experiences for visitors will have a positive impact on the youth participants' understanding of the engineering disciplines, and on visitors' perceptions of engineering and its relationship to everyday life.
The project will use observations, interviews, journaling, and the Engineering Professional Skills Assessment to explore youth experience, and visitor exit surveys and interviews to probe visitor perceptions. Both the skills assessment and visitor surveys are NSF-funded instruments. Data coding will be grounded in the engineering habits of mind defined by the National Research Council's Committee on Understanding and Improving K-12 Engineering Education in the United States (2009). The project will capture evidence regarding which habits of mind the Fellows are most frequently engaged with. The effort will also explore how interactions with peers (as colleagues), with experts (as learners, such as with Designers in Residence) and with visitors (as teachers and leaders) may be associated with different combinations of the habits of mind over the course of the project. Visitor data and assessment data will allow the project to begin to make analytic connections between participating young people's increased understanding of culturally-situated engineering challenges, and their impact on the experiences of museum visitors who engage with engineering programming at the Hall of Science.
In this paper we share an emerging analytical approach to designing and studying STEAM programs that focuses on how programs integrate the respective epistemic practices—the ways in which knowledge is constructed—of science and art. We share the rationale for moving beyond surface features of STEAM programs (e.g., putting textiles and electronics on the same table) to the disciplinary-specific ways in which participants are engaged in creative inquiry and production. We share a brief example from a public STEAM event to demonstrate the ways in which this approach can foster reflection and
As science communication develops as a field of both practice and research, it needs to address issues of equity, diversity, and inclusion across a wide range, including race, power, class, gender. Doing so will require deeper understanding of conceptual work and practical activities that address those issues. This brief comment introduces a series of commentaries that provide one approach: feminist approaches to science communication.