![\"\"](\"http:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/files\/2017\/05\/34233458765_75f350492f_o-e1493689416556.jpg\")
<\/a>This year, the enviro-political mood is more somber. Emotions in the GEMM Lab swing between anger and dismay to cautious optimism and hope. The anger comes from threatened budget cuts, the dismissal of climate science, and the restructuring of government agencies, while we find hope at the outpouring of support from our local communities, and the energy building behind the March for Science movement<\/a>.<\/p>\n What is perhaps most striking about the movement is how celebratory it feels<\/a>. Instead of marching against something, we are marching FOR science, in all its myriad forms. With clever signs and chants like \u201cThe oceans are rising, and so are we\u201d, \u201cScience, not Silence\u201d, and \u201cWe\u2019re nerds, we\u2019re wet, we\u2019re really quite upset\u201d (it rained on a lot of marches on Saturday) echoing around the globe, Saturday\u2019s Marches for Science were a cathartic release of energy, a celebration of like-minded people.<\/p>\n While millions of enthusiastic people were marching through the streets, I \u201cRan for Science\u201d at the 20th<\/sup> annual National Ocean Science Bowl (NOSB)<\/a> – delivering question sheets and scores between competitors and graders as 25 teams competed for the title of national champion! Over the course of the competition, teams of four high school students compete through rounds of buzzer-style multiple choice questions, worksheet style team challenge questions, and the Scientific Expert Briefing, a mock congressional hearing where students present science recommendations on a piece of legislation.\u00a0 The challenges are unified with a yearly theme, which in 2017 was Blue Energy: powering the planet with our ocean.<\/a>\u00a0 Watching the students (representing 33 states!) compete is exciting and inspiring, because they obviously know the material, and are passionate about the subject matter.\u00a0 Even more encouraging though, is realizing that not all of them plan to look for jobs as research scientists. Some express interest in the arts, some in policy, or teaching or engineering. This competition is not just about fostering the next generation of leading marine scientists, but rather about creating an ocean-literate, and scientifically-literate populace.\u00a0 So, congratulations to Santa Monica High School, who took home the national title for the first time this year! Would you like to test your knowledge against some of the questions they faced? Try your luck here!<\/a><\/p>\n The GEMM Lab also recently participated in the Hatfield Marine Science Center\u2019s Marine Science Day<\/a>.\u00a0 It\u2019s an annual open house where the community is invited to come tour labs, meet scientists, get behind the scenes, and learn about all the exciting research going on.\u00a0 For us as researchers, it\u2019s a great day to practice explaining our work and its relevance to many different groups, from school children to parents and grandparents, from artists to fishermen to teachers, fellow researchers, and many others.\u00a0 This year the event attracted over 2,000 people, and the GEMM Lab was proud to be a part of this uniquely interactive day. \u00a0Outreach events like this help us feel connected to our community and the excitement present in all the questions field during this event reassure us that the public still cares about the work that we do.<\/p>\n Our science is interdisciplinary, and we recognize the strength of multiple complimentary avenues of action to affect change.\u00a0 If you are looking to get involved, consider taking a look at these groups:<\/p>\n 500 Women Scientists<\/a>: \u201cworking to promote a diverse and inclusive scientific community that brings progressive science-based solutions to local and global challenges.\u201d Read their take on the March for Science.<\/a><\/p>\n 314Action<\/a>: starting from Pi (3.14), their mission is \u201cto (1) strengthen communication among the STEM community, the public and our elected officials, (2) Educate and advocate for and defend the integrity of science and its use, (3) Provide a voice for the STEM community on social issues, (4) Promote the responsible use of data driven fact based approaches in public policy and (5) Increase public engagement with the STEM Community through media.\u201d<\/p>\n She should run<\/a>: \u201cA movement working to create a culture that inspires women and girls to aspire towards public leadership. We believe that women of all backgrounds should have an equal shot at elected leadership and that our country will benefit from having a government with varied perspectives and experiences.\u201d https:\/\/peoplesclimate.org\/<\/a><\/p>\n And finally, The March for Science<\/a> is finishing up it\u2019s week of action<\/a>, culminating in the People\u2019s Climate March<\/a> on April 29.<\/p>\n How will you carry the cause of science forward?<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By Florence Sullivan, MSc student, Oregon State University. Earth day is a worldwide event celebrated annually on April 22, and is typically observed with beach, park, or neighborhood clean ups, and outreach events sponsored by environmental groups.\u00a0 Last year, environmentalists rejoiced when 195 nations signed the Paris Agreement \u2013 to \u201cstrengthen global response to the … Continue reading \u201cMarching for Science\u201d takes many forms<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6597,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1310584],"tags":[712786,140586,712899,712846,635445,1696,532,635712,712919,712970,513,712972,1398,148762,482,318,5],"class_list":["post-1265","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-outreach","tag-collaborative-research","tag-conservation","tag-dawn-barlow","tag-florence-sullivan","tag-gemm-lab","tag-hatfield-marine-science-center","tag-hmsc","tag-leigh-torres","tag-leila-lemos","tag-march-for-science","tag-marine-mammals","tag-national-ocean-science-bowl","tag-oregon","tag-oregon-coast","tag-outreach","tag-politics","tag-science"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1265","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6597"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1265"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1265\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1272,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1265\/revisions\/1272"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1265"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1265"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1265"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a>