Tag Archives: AAAS

AAAS Annual Meeting 2015

By Laurel Kristick

February 12-16, 2015

San Jose California

Summary:

This was an excellent conference for librarians interested in science, communication, policy, education and related issues. The theme of the meeting was Innovations, Information, and Imaging. The sessions I attended were focused on research integrity, diversity in STEM, outreach and engagement, and science communication. I was able to attend three sessions where OSU faculty were speaking or moderating: Francis Chan (Integrative Biology), Paul Farber (History), Anita Guerrini (History). There were also a number of sessions that I would have liked to attend but conflicted with other sessions.

Key Takeaways:

  • Outreach and engagement are important for academics and other researchers. If you want involvement from others there are 3 models from citizen science: contributory (citizens contribute data), collaborative (citizens take part in planning or analyzing), Co-created (2-way learning process between scientists and citizens)
  • In scientific outreach and communication, the LIVA strategy can help with addressing the biases of the audience: LIVA = Leverage scientific credibility and Involve the audience in Visualizing scientific evidence and making sense of an illustrative Analogy.
  • Research Misconduct is a systemic issue, not just a few bad apples, and organizational change and mentoring may be needed to fix systemic problems (SIDENOTE: on the flight home, I was readingMistakes Were Made (But Not By Me), which reflects many of the ideas I heard at the conference about research integrity)
  • The “leaking pipeline” analogy related to diversity in STEM education is flawed as it only considers the path from doctoral student to full professor in a research university; need to include alternative career paths (policy, science communication, liberal arts schools, community college, industry) – are the graduates utilizing their education and experience; are they doing what they want

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