Tag Archives: conference

Event review: BIG science communication summit

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Thanks to Victoria Leitch, for writing this event review.

The BIG science communication summit promised to be a BIG event… and it was.

We fell in love with the critically endangered Baw Baw frog, went wild with some (suitable for work) selfies, visualised rips with purple dye at Bondi and saw Derek Muller (creator of Veritasium) berate himself on film for his own alleged pretentious douchebag-ness. We were disappointed that Craig Reucassel didn’t chair his session in Nicole Kidman-esque shorts, but you can’t win them all.

Along with the fun, however, there was a serious side to the BIG science communication summit. While our speakers used some incredible case studies to show us that we are having some real successes with science communication in Australia, our group discussions and workshops told us that we are not quite there – yet.

The collaborative format of the workshop sessions gave everyone the opportunity to raise their concerns and voice their ideas on where we should be heading in the future. Although the delegates were separated into 5 streams of discussion, the results showed that on many of the issues relating to the impediments to science communication in Australia, we are thinking the same thing. Just a few of the recurring impediments that were highlighted by the workshops were:

  • A need for defined leadership, aims and goals in science communication
  • A lack of ways to evaluate and measure projects
  • A fear or mistrust of communication, communicators and the technology involved

Like any good workshop session we raised a lot of questions, but taking it one step further than many workshops – we came up with answers. Ideas to combat the impediments above and others can be seen at the solutions page of the summit.

After two full days of science communication brainstorming, the summit culminated in a promise. A promise to do more, and in a group therapy style moment, we all made a commitment to doing our part in improving the engagement of science in Australia.

If you did miss the summit, I recommend you look at the blogs which were lovingly prepared by the amazing team of bloggers.

Thank you to the BIG science communication summit team, looking forward to the next one!

From the President – Rod’s update

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Howdy folks,

Well aren’t these exciting times to be an ASC-ist? This month marks the beginning of the formal process we hope will lead the ASC down the path to professionalisation.

Professionalisation will lift the value of everyone’s ASC membership to the next level. Being a member of a professional ASC association should be a peer-endorsement of competence (hell, let’s say excellence) in whatever aspect of science communication that member operates. I personally would love to see a time where people who want to engage science communication services actively look for membership of the ASC as a badge of trustworthiness and expertise that is second to none.

The call for initial submissions went out from Will Grant to the ASC list on March 27, and already a solid handful of responses has come back. We have received interesting and useful thoughts, and also some offers of help to move us ahead. There is a very enthusiastic vibe surrounding this process so far, and I hope any and all of you who are interested will get on the band wagon.

Of course, this is not a trivial exercise, and the ramifications are not trivial either. If you have any ideas or comments, concerns or reservations, please contact Will or me.

We are also now in the build-up to the Big Science Communication Summit in June, an event that will have a strong ASC presence woven throughout (stay tuned for more via the list). For me, this really marks the beginning of the countdown to the ASC conference in February 2014, and I expect that issues, ideas and relationships from the Summit will inspire us in building our own conference.

And speaking of the 2014 ASC national conference … would you like to be part of the conference team? We need a few dedicated and idea-rich folks to play with us starting ASAP. Please contact me if you want to explore the wonder that is the ASC conference committee!

Cheers for now,

Rod

Dr Rod Lamberts

National President

Australian Science Communicators

http://www.asc.asn.au/

 

Inspiring Australia update: Science communication summit, 6-7 June 2013 at UNSW

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Want to add your two cents to science communication? Inspiring Australia has announced a two day meeting where everyone’s contributions can add up to a big deposit for Australia’s science communication future.

The BIG science communication summit – pathways to inspiring Australia

Inspiring Australia, TechNyou and ScienceRewired are excited to announce a 2-day hands-on summit to map out the next challenges for science communications in Australia and to collaboratively address best-practice solutions.

Bringing the country’s leading science communicators, innovators, science journalists, decision makers and educators together, the summit is an opportunity for participants to individually and collectively compare, shape and influence their science communications directions and activities.

Register your interest to attend sciencerewired.org/summit

SAVE THE DATE!

6th & 7th June
University of New South Wales
Scientia Conference and Events Centre

Produced in partnership with

ASC2014 will be at the Brisbane Convention and Exhibition Centre

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We have selected one of the best convention centres in the world as the venue for our next national conference. The Brisbane Convention and Exhibition Centre’s new wing on Grey Street has a 400 seat auditorium, breakout rooms, a large foyer for displays, meals and networking, and easy access to the cultural precinct of Brisbane’s South Bank.

Overall the BCEC is an amazing venue. It’s huge in scale yet welcoming, with superb design and the latest in conference facilities. It has excellent catering facilities and is centrally located. The new wing of the centre will suit the scale of our conference perfectly.

We are starting to get ideas for the program and will be inviting your contribution soon.

Book in the dates 3-5 February 2014 for ASC2014. See you in Brisbane.

Jesse Shore
ASC President

Next ASC national conference – February 2014

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The ASC Executive has agreed that the next ASC national conference will be held in early February 2014. I’ll keep you on tenterhooks by saying that we’ll announce the city and venue soon.

The feedback from ASC2012 delegates have helped guide our planning and we’ll use their input to make ASC2014 even better than the terrific outcome Rod Lamberts and his team achieved this year.

We have started to consider the structure of the conference committee and will invite members to participate. The good amount of lead time should allow us to explore new ideas and get more supporting partners for our big biannual event.

That’s all the snippets of conference news for now but be ready for lots more substantial information to come.

Jesse Shore
National President

Chief Scientist’s speech to ASC conference – the transcript of Ian Chubb’s presentation

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Professor Ian Chubb, Australia’s Chief Scientist, was a worthy voice to present the Robyn William’s address, to open the ASC conference. Ian’s presentation started minds thinking and the points he raised kept delegates challenged throughout the 3 days of the event.

Kali Madden is continuing the spade work needed to post podcasts of various plenary sessions on the ASC website. Look for them to start rolling out in another month or two. In the meantime I’m posting the pdf of the transcript of Ian Chubb’s speech.

Jesse Shore
National President

Ian Chubb’s ASC2012 speech, 27 February 2012

 

 

SocMed Stars

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Thanks to Kristin Alford from Bridge 8 for contributing this article:

The ability to synthesise complex information and articulate it in a clear and concise way is a skill. When that is done well within a strict word limit under tight deadlines, it’s something to celebrate.
Kylie Sturgess (@kyliesturgess <http://twitter.com/kyliesturgess> ), Dr Krystal Evans (@dr_krystal <http://twitter.com/dr_krystal> ) and Dr Sarah Keenihan (@sciencesarah <http://twitter.com/sciencesarah> ) are worth celebrating.

Over the course of the Australian Science Communicators Conference in 2012 <http://2012conf.asc.asn.au/>  they made sense of the content in short sharp bursts using a range of social media platforms. Kylie live-blogged many of the sessions and has several podcasts, Krystal live-tweeted almost everything and Sarah both live-tweeted and provided Storify summaries.

If you were at the conference and drew on the back channel to see what others were thinking or to catch up on parallel sessions you couldn’t get to, you would have appreciated their contributions. If you weren’t at the conference, their commentaries and summaries made it possible to follow along. This was certainly the case for Ed Brown (@reallyedbrown <http://twitter.com/reallyedbrown> ) who interviewed all three in his ‘Science on Top’ podcast <http://scienceontop.com/2012/03/sot-special-asc2012/>  (this link includes all Kylie’s blogs, other links and Ed’s own Storify summaries of Day 2 and 3).

As producer of the social media session <http://2012conf.asc.asn.au/2011/12/24/plenary-6-sophisticated-social-media-use-science/> , I was certainly interested to see what the back channel had discussed during the session, so seeing Kylie’s blog <http://freethoughtblogs.com/tokenskeptic/2012/02/28/live-blogging-the-sophisticated-social-media-use-and-science-asc2012/>  and Sarah’s Storify <http://storify.com/sciencesarah/asc2012-plenarysophisticated-social-media-use-and>  was immensely useful, and both made it easier to share the content with others later. Mentioning this later on Twitter also brought endorsement that the contribution was worth recognising.

Congratulations and thank you Kylie, Krystal and Sarah. A specially-designed certificate from James Hutson is on its way.

(Also published at http://bridge8.wordpress.com/2012/03/19/socmed-stars-at-the-asc-conference/)

Dr Kristin Alford
Futurist & Founding Director
Bridge8 Pty Ltd
http://www.bridge8.com.au

ASC National conference 2012 – three great days

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What happens when you have 250 science communicators in the same place at the same time? Going on observations from the recent national conference in Sydney you get an intense buzz of social networking. Every face to face gathering was busy with people talking, laughing, exchanging ideas and contact details, moving around to meet new people and to catch up with a wide range of colleagues. Cyberspace was filled with an intense stream of tweets which lasted well after the conference – and they are still coming although now at a trickle (see #ASC2012 for the latest). One tweeter during the conference pleaded for others to slow the pace as he couldn’t keep up with the flow and catch a moment of the sessions at the same time.

We are still digesting the results of the post-conference on-line survey. We had around 130 completed questionnaires – a great response rate. I’m happy to report overwhelmingly positive feedback. There were good suggestions for improvements which will be considered as we start planning for the next national gathering.

I look forward to developing the relationships with the federal and five state Chief Scientists and with all the Inspiring Australia representatives who featured at the conference. The ASC is growing its connections all the time.

My choices for conference highlights

Day 1: Ian Chubb’s talk provoked much ongoing discussion about several big topics and issues. One was that public interest in science developed countries is declining while the inverse is true in developing economies. Why is this? Is this a worrying trend (I say yes)? What do we do about it? Is there an inverse relation between celebrity appreciation and cerebrum use?

The cocktail function at the end of Day 1 gave us a look at UTS’s impressive new function space. Around 150 delegates got together for two hours of intense chatting and mixing in a most pleasant atmosphere. I thought this worked far better than a sit down dinner for networking. Also we didn’t have to charge for the event (thanks to UTS sponsoring this most hospitable function).

Day 2: The opening plenary about career possibilities for science communicators featured good energy and diverse jobs paths. It not only highlighted several talented early career sci-commers but revealed the Australian Museum was holding a ‘Jurassic Lounge’ event that night which added to delegates’ choice of social events for the evening. I enjoyed the ABC Café Scientific chat-fest but I noted the tweet stream from rapt Jurassic Loungers.

Day 3: Chris Fluke in the morning plenary said that he was satisfied with 85% accuracy in his astronomical animations (he sometimes exaggerates vertical scale for visual effect). This kicked-off a discussion topic that we won’t see the end of. In the afternoon plenary about science to policy I was interested to hear about how rallies of scientists were organised to get media attention and public support to pressure the government not to cut funding for medical research work. The threatened funding cut was a rumour at the time but timely action of getting scientists onto the streets may have been instrumental in preserving funds during a cost-cutting period.

Days 1-3: I was also impressed with the efforts exhibitors at the conference put into making their display areas look appealing. It enticed me to chat with a few of them and I would have visited all the stands if I had less running around to do.

The Science-As-Art exhibition seemed to be a big hit. More than 100 votes were cast for the People’s Choice winner and there was a lot of feedback that the exhibition should be a regular feature of future conferences.

Several teams of people worked hard and effectively to achieve a great conference. The ASC conference organising teams lead by Rod Lamberts are deservedly basking in the bright glow of congratulations for the high quality of the overall event. Our professional conference convenors ensured that all ran smoothly and made the most of the excellent venue.

So how do we do even better next time? I’ll leave that to you to send your suggestions.

Jesse Shore
National President

ASC2012 – three days is not enough

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Overview: The ASC2012 conference forms a great package. The program features impressive speakers and important topics, with appealing social events from Sunday through Tuesday nights, and a few deals for attractions while you are in Sydney.

Chief Scientist plenary extended: Given we have a plethora of Chief Scientists, we have extended the duration of their plenary. The session will start at 2.00pm as per the program and run until 3.00pm or 3.15pm (with a slim chance of going to 3.30pm), to allow plenty of interchange, discussion and exploration of issues.

This will leave 15-30 minutes before the afternoon tea break. Some or all the Chief Scientists will go to the refreshment area at this time where you can gather around a Chief Scientist for an informal conversation.

The rooms reserved for the previously scheduled concurrent sessions will be available, should a Chief Scientist choose to give a short presentation or have a more formal Q&A. Either way, you have an opportunity to talk with the state Chief Scientist of your choice.

Sessions will be recorded: the audio of all sessions will be recorded and some sessions will be videoed. This will serve as a resource for conference goers.

Full house of exhibitors: a range of organisations will have booths at the conference where you can talk with their key people. Find out what each organisation has to offer and quiz them about their science communication skills and achievements. The booths will be in the Banquet Hall and will be busiest during the refreshment and lunch breaks.

Science-As-Art Exhibition: the Science-As-Art exhibition at the conference will showcase examples of science visualisation created by scientists and science communicators right across Australia. Prizes will be awarded for the best entry. Also look at the artist-inspired Periodic Table on Show, made to celebrate the 2011 International Year of Chemistry.

Jesse Shore
National President

ASC conference – a social happening

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Cocktails in UTS’s new Great Hall? Café Scientific in a pub? Book Launch event of The Genome Generation? Pre-conference drinks with sci-comm up-and-comings?

Yes to all! The conference social calendar is now in place and we even offer a choice on the Tuesday evening.

First off is a relaxed pre-conference get-together at the Belgian Beer Café in the Rocks on Sunday 26 February from 6pm. Will Grant is organising this event. Reply to his tweet @willozap if attending.

Science Communication Tweetup pre #asc2012. 6pm, 26th Feb, Belgian Beer Cafe The Rocks (See Map Here) ping @willozap if attending!

Get dressed up on Monday 27 February for a cocktail function from 6-8pm at the newly refurbished Great Hall of the University Technology Sydney. All registered conference delegates are invited to this convivial gathering. Arrive on time to mingle and relax. There will be a couple of brief presentations and then some more mingling, etc. UTS has a lot to show off – you’ll hear about the exciting major rejuvenation of the university and its neighbourhood, its new science facilities and novel partnerships in communicating science. The Great Hall is in the Tower building on Broadway in Ultimo, a short walk or a quick bus ride from the conference venue.

Tuesday 28 February offers two events from 6-8pm for different tastes. In fact your choice of which one to go to may be influenced by where you want to eat afterwards.

  • The science team at the ABC with support from NETS and Rod Lamberts, our conference convenor, are putting on a light-hearted conversation about seriously communicating science, and the best part is that’s in a pub (location TBA).
  • The second event is in restaurant rich Glebe (a short bus or taxi ride from the Masonic Centre). Elizabeth Finkel’s latest book, The Genome Generation, will be launched at Gleebooks on Glebe Point Road. The first 20 delegates to RSVP will get free entry (otherwise $10). Drinks are available. Elizabeth will be in conversation with Wilson da Silva, editor-in-chief of Cosmos Magazine. See http://www.gleebooks.com.au/default.asp?p=events/events4_htm#Elizabeth_Finkel.

More information about how to RSVP for the events will come soon.

More details are being added to the conference program and many sessions have powerful panels of potent presenters. The sooner you register the quicker you can reserve your place for sessions and events that have limited numbers.

So get organised and get registered – go to http://2012conf.asc.asn.au/register/ to make it happen.

Jesse Shore
National President