by Judy Scotchmoor

We are pleased to announce the receipt of an unrestricted gift in the amount of $25,000 from The Whitman Institute to support the Coalition on the Public Understanding of Science (COPUS) project.

Being involved in COPUS has been an extraordinary experience, but it is not all that easy to explain - probably because it is so simple. It is all about connecting people and ideas and the common thread is sharing science.

The idea for COPUS began in 2006 at UCMP with an NSF-funded meeting of a small eclectic group of people all perturbed by a growing anti-science sentiment. Eventually it evolved into its current form and the Year of Science 2009, but even more importantly it initiated new relationships and collaborations, most of which do not advertise any formal connection to COPUS, so it is kind of hard to see all that COPUS has and continues to accomplish. For instance, here at Berkeley, several of us got together to decide how our campus could use the concept of the YoS09 to promote the depth and breadth of science that takes place on our campus - as a result, the Science@Cal initiative was born. Now, each Cal Day, science units on campus coordinate their efforts; we are planning a science festival on campus as a satellite event to the USA Science and Engineering Festival on October 23rd; and each month those of us involved in education and outreach get together for a brown bag lunch to discuss projects, share ideas, and learn from one another.

Locally, COPUS and the YoS09 also initiated a thematic approach to local science cafes, events at the California Academy of Sciences, and home page highlights on the website of Lawrence Berkeley Lab. But perhaps most importantly, COPUS initiated the emergence of Bay Area Science, a loose network of more than 100 science organizations in the Bay Area, sharing a common website and event calendar, interacting informally, and now working together toward a 2011 Bay Area Science Festival.

This COPUS "underground movement" has taken place in many different regions of the US - all sparked by connecting people and ideas. For those of you who have read The Starfish and the Spider by Brafman and Beckstrom, COPUS definitely follows the starfish model - there is no Director or CEO - those who are the most active (and that can be any body) influence the directions that COPUS will take, always striving for finding effective ways to engage the public in the wonders of science. It amazes me to realize the number of people that I now interact with because of COPUS - from an ex cheerleader for the Philadelphia '76ers now known as the Science Cheerleader, to a vibrant mom of two in Florida, a bioengineer at MIT, a chemist in Northridge who teaches science to cops, and a scientist who uses "science zines" to focus on science concepts for art students in Chicago. They are all part of my extended COPUS family and help me to see new ways to communicate about science.

Some people instantly "get it" and jump on board, easily finding a way through which they can gain and/or contribute to the efforts of COPUS. For others, it is less obvious. But we were amazed and delighted when we received support in 2008 from two foundations - the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation and The Whitman Institute - thanks to two individuals, who "got it:" Soo Venkatesan, now a project manager for the S.D. Bechtel Jr. Foundation, and John Esterle, the Executive Director of The Whitman Institute. They each facilitated an investment in COPUS, recognizing the potential of such a unique grassroots effort. We are very grateful to both Soo and John and in particular to The Whitman Institute (TWI) for this recent gift. There is an elegant match between what COPUS is trying to do and TWI, which is a private foundation located in San Francisco, dedicated to promoting ways for people to develop their capacity to think critically.

Have you started planning for participation in the The USA Science & Engineering Festival??

The Inaugural USA Science & Engineering Festival will be the nation's first celebration of science and engineering innovation in our nation's capital. The festival will run for two weeks, October 10-24, 2010. Its capstone will be a two day Expo on the National Mall, featuring exhibits and performances from some of the most dynamic speakers and performers in science and engineering, including: Darlene Cavalier - The Science Cheerleader, the Banana Slug String Band, Nick Walker - the Weather Dude, science comedian Brian Marlow, chemist Dr. Joe Schwarcz, and many more! The festival is supported by over 350 leading science organizations including Lockheed Martin, Popular Science Magazine, and Scientific American.

However,this celebration is not confined to our nation's capitol - this is a nationwide celebration. Organizations across the country are encouraged to host a Satellite Event in their communities, during the same weekend -- October 23 and 24, 2010, when hundreds of thousands of people will celebrate science on the National Mall. In fact, if your organization already has an event in the works, then you can register it as a Satellite Event of the USA Science & Engineering Festival. Satellite Events can be as small or as big as you want. They range from a single activity to a full-fledged Festival. They include Science Family Days, contests, workshops, Citizen Science projects, a science scavenger hunt, or whatever you want it to be, as long as it is educational, fun, science-related, and free to the general public! You create it, and the USA Science & Engineering Festival team will help you market it by including your information on the Festival website. To host a Satellite Event, please click here. Fill out a brief online form to let Festival organizers know you are planning an event. Or partner with a Satellite Event organizer in your area. Satellite Events are currently being planned in several communities throughout the United States. If you would like to partner with a Satellite Event organizer in your community, contact Ruth Kiefer at rkiefer@mindspring.com and she will gladly connect you to the right people.

For more information about the inaugural USA Science & Engineering Festival visit www.usasciencefestival.org.

A focus group of science outreach advocates met at the University of California Berkeley March 22-23, 2010. Thanks to the generous support of The Whitman Institute, fifteen scientists, educators, and public engagement specialists from across the United States convened to discuss the future directions of COPUS - The Coalition on the Public Understanding of Science.  One of our many tasks for the one and a half day meeting was to outline the future and significance of COPUS beyond its very successful Year of Science celebration that engaged thousands of people, through numerous programs that took place across the country.

In the first of a series about the future of COPUS, I am introducing the newly formed COPUS Core - the individuals involved in shaping the future of COPUS.

Introducing the COPUS Core

A business should be part of the community - both receiving from and giving back to their customers and the communities they live in. Guardian Insurance is committed to the necessity of giving back, and in this spirit is supporting the Year of Science in 2009 project.

The Year of Science celebrates sciences from astronomy to zoology to help boost the level of public understanding of how science works. Each month during the year of celebration is focused on a specific theme that explains the process, methods and nature of the scientific method in different fields. In 2009, for example, monthly themes included "Sustainability and the Environment" and "Geosciences and the Planet Earth."

In the end, the Year of Science project hopes to inform people, and especially the young, as to why science matters and is important for improving our lives.

By supporting the Year of Science in 2009 project, Guardian Insurance hopes to improve the appreciation of the sciences and to encourage interest in scientific subjects among young people. By giving back to the community, everybody including Guardian Insurance benefits! For information on Guardian Life Insurance please visit guardianisurance.com.au.

Giving back to the community is a core value at Real Insurance. We believe that giving back should make a positive impact on the people that we serve, and the world in which we live.

One of the many ways we give back is to support initiatives that make an impact on the lives of students. We are also committed to leaving a positive footprint in the sustainability of our planet.

By supporting Year of Science 2009 we are fostering both of these ideals.

Helping students understand why science matters will make a difference in their lives and in the lives of future generations. The enthusiasm, creativity and knowledge of bright minds are crucial as we face the global changes in our environment. We want to be a part of helping students become excited about science! This excitement can lead them into important careers in a scientific field.

Each month The Year of Science introduces and theme that explores the wide variety of scientific fields. These diverse themes include "Sustainability and the Environment" and "Geosciences and the Planet Earth."

Real Insurance is a green company, and being part of The Year of Science is only one way that we demonstrate our commitment to global sustainability and ecological awareness. For information on Real Life Insurance please visit realinsurance.com.au.

Make summer fun. Make a science engagement video and win cash prizes to support science or math education at your school!

The Kavli Foundation in partnership with SciVee, is hosting a “Why Science is Cool” video contest. The Kavli video contest is structured to offer unlimited opportunities for teachers to mine their curriculum concepts more deeply while engaging their students to explore science and engineering from a personalized standpoint. All students in grades K-12 are eligible to compete. They produce a 30 - 90 second video about why they think science is great. Videos should be creative and demonstrate the student’s enthusiasm for science and engineering.

Participants in the COPUS Project website (COPUS) enjoyed a fantastic Year of Science 2009. It was a twelve-month celebration of every discipline of science and we met our goal of engaging the public in science and innovation. However, our work is not done; and neither is the excitement that was generated from the community science events. In fact, COPUS is revving up its engines to take public engagement of science to the next level; and we want you to be a part of this movement!

COPUS is a grassroots community of individuals, organizations, and institutions who passionately care about enhancing science literacy among all citizens.

COPUS is a network. We are a community of scientists, engineers, teachers, students, parents, and everyday people who are committed to sharing science with everyone! We catalyze connections among those committed to facilitating communication of science to society.

COPUS is a resource. We share information about local, regional, and national science outreach and public programs. COPUS is a conduit to participation in public outreach. We facilitate communication and collaboration of local outreach partners to community programs. We also mobilize volunteers to participate in local and national scientific celebrations, such as the Year of Science 2009, and the USA Science & Engineering Festival 2010. Finally, we coordinate content such as Understanding Science, a resource created by and for COPUS community members, to help communicate the scientific process to the general public.

Our emphasis is to connect people to each other and everyone to science outreach resources.

Ready to join the COPUS movement?
If you participate in broader impacts for your research or through your professional organizations, then you already are. Simply, sign up on the COPUS Project website and let us know how you share science in your local community or participate in public outreach programs.

Not participating in an ongoing broader impact project? Then we recommend participating in an upcoming Community Science Event. Here are a few days to mark on your calendar:

May 12, 2010, is National Lab Day. In communities all over the USA, local teachers are conducting exciting hands-on science activities for their K-12 students. Local scientists, science organizations, and volunteers work with these educators to make it happen! See what is happening in your area and sign up to volunteer. http://www.nationallabday.org/

October 23-24, 2010, is the USA Science & Engineering Festival Expo in Washington, DC. The country's first national science festival promises to be the ultimate multi-cultural, multi-generational, and multi-disciplinary celebration of science in the United States. The Expo is being celebrated nationally, as well. Local universities, science organizations, and institutions are being asked to organize satellite event in each of their communities. Share science locally and connect to other science events across the nation. http://www.usasciencefestival.org/

Be sure to drop us a line and let us know how you engage the public in understanding science.

Life generates a lot of data – the number of hours you spend awake and asleep and at your desk and in your car; the foods you eat; the pace of your morning run. I just read a great article in the New York Times Magazine, The Data-Driven Life, about geeky guys who are obsessed with self-tracking – gathering data about their daily lives and distilling from these data information about how to improve their lives. How to work more efficiently, run faster, feel happier. This got me thinking about how self-tracking might be a great hook to get people interested in science – and in one of my favorite little corners of science, data analysis.

The guys in the article were for the most part tech-savvy nerds. They recorded copious data, like what they ate, how much money they spent, and… every single idea they had since 1984. This allowed them to figure out things, like exactly how much time one man spent cleaning up after a messy roommate. Or how many tablespoons of flaxseed oil another man needs to take to maximize his concentration.

I think people could really get into this. Everyone likes to know more about himself. And there could be some tangible benefits: in today's bad economic times, people could really benefit from knowing exactly how they spend their money. And in this image-obsessed society, understanding how diet and exercise affect your own weight – not just the weight of Hollywood types – could be very very appealing. Is that $10 skin cream just as good as the $100 skin cream? Run your own test (controlling for potentially influencing co-variables!) and find out for yourself.

Collecting data is easy. There are all kinds of ways to automate data collection (companies like Google collect tons of data about you already). Depending on the kind of data you want to collect, cheap sensors might already exist, such as accelerometers for your running shoes, or tiny temperature loggers (I tend to sleep better with the window open – is that because the room is cooler?). And smartphones make it easy to collect data on the fly – and can remind you to record your mood or what you ate.

The next step, data analysis, is the best part. This is where people can really learn about how science works. Using their own life as an example, people can understand concepts like correlation versus causation, signal versus noise, controlling for confounding variables, and the importance of replication. It would be super to have a website to help you track your data – and easily analyze and graph it. The website Gapminder is an elegant model.

Last week, I started keeping track of how much time I spend working on each of my many work projects each day. Myriad web-based programs are out there to help you track your time. For me, self-tracking is simultaneously a bit tedious and super interesting. I can see how, once I get into the habit of recording what I'm doing, it can become an obsession. There are so many questions I can ask about my own work habits and efficiency! Now I need a spreadsheet to track more variables – only then will I figure out if my ability to concentrate correlates with the number of cups of coffee I consume! 

The COPUS community works to increase public dialog about science - and all those who are passionate about science are invited to be a part of that dialog! To spread the word about COPUS efforts to the scientific community, several COPUS members held a workshop at the Society of Integrative and Comparative Biology (SICB) annual meeting in Seattle in January 2010. It was a nice way to book end the Year of Science 2009 - YoS was launched at 2009's SICB meeting in Boston. At this year's SICB meeting, the COPUS workshop was presented by Mark Terry, Jen Collins, Jim Kenagy, and Jeanne Chowning. They talked with scientists about education and outreach efforts, focusing on activities celebrated by COPUS, such as the Northwest Association for Biomedical Research, the Understanding Science web resource, and the USA Science and Engineering Festival.

Jeanne Chowning of the Northwest Association for Biomedical Research talked about a fantastic program called Student Bio Expo. This program matches high school students with mentors in the scientific community. Students work with their mentors in research facilities and do independent research projects. It gives the students an in-depth look at science as a career - and it provides a great opportunity for mentorship. Many of the scientists found that participating re-affirmed their reasons for becoming scientists in the first place. The program culminates in the Student Bio Expo, where students present posters about their work. The Student Bio Expo website has a great video that explains the program - evidence of the program's success is visible in the many smiling faces of both students and scientists! This program is a great example of how the scientific research community can be involved in science outreach.

In addition to the workshop, COPUS activities were represented by Jennifer Collins, from the Consortium for Ocean Leadership. She gave a talk about a species naming contest that was part of the Year of Science 2009. Over 500 people entered the contest to name a putative new species of banded box jellyfish - but over the course of the contest, the scientists involved decided that it was premature to designate this banded box jelly as a unique species. Read more about the jellyfish naming contest on the Year of Science 2009 website.

COPUS folks also had a booth in the meeting's exhibit hall. (When the workshop is standing-room-only, an exhibit booth is a good way to connect with people who can't fit in the room!) Mark Terry and Jim Kenagy report that they had numerous worthwhile conversations with SICB scientists who were interested in learning more about education outreach opportunities.

COPUS booths at scientific meetings are a great way to connect your scientific meeting with the local community, to spread the word about great outreach programs, and to inspire scientists to get involved in communicating and celebrating science. If you would like to learn more, please contact Jennifer Skene at skene@berkeley.edu.

Grab your gear and join us for the 2010 National Geographic -- National Park Service Biscayne National Park BioBlitz, April 30-May 1

Grab your gear and join us for the 2010 National Geographic - National Park Service Biscayne National Park BioBlitz, April 30 - May 1. This distinctive scientific experience--part contest, part festival, and part educational event - will bring together school children, college students, families and scientists in a race against time to see how many species they can count in a 24-hour biological survey. The Encyclopedia of Life (EOL), a free, online resource with authoritative information about biodiversity, is the perfect BioBlitz companion from start to finish.

Participants can visit EOL at eol.org before, during and after the Blitz to learn more about the plants and animals that can be found in Biscayne National Park. To get in the mood for the marine biodiversity they'll be observing they can listen to an EOL podcast on box jellyfish or sea cucumbers. They can also dive into a virtual coral reef at WhyReef.com to learn fun facts about marine ecosystems and food webs. Participants are sure to discover that not everything in Biscayne National Park lives underwater, as hundreds of species of birds, plants, and insects can be found in the terrestrial areas of the park.

During the BioBlitz, participants can help to grow the Encyclopedia of Life by participating in our photo scavenger hunt. Just pick up a sheet at the EOL table in the exhibit area before beginning your adventure and try to mark off everything on the list. We're offering great prizes for those who return the sheet at the end of their BioBlitz and upload their images to the EOL Biscayne BioBlitz Flickr group.

Even if you do not participate in the scavenger hunt, there will be information available to help you upload your images from home or school. It's free and easy. Once participants have uploaded images, they will show up on EOL so others can find what they saw and learned during the BioBlitz.

As an additional resource, National Geographic's FieldScope application is available to BioBlitz participants to assist in mapping and analysis and to enable collaboration among participants and the scientific community. National Geographic, EOL, and the National Park Service will incorporate the use of FieldScope into the upcoming BioBlitz. During the event, photos contributed to National Park Service for upload into Fieldscope will be posted to EOL species pages automatically.

You can also share comments and observations on EOL species pages after you explore Biscayne National Park. Members of the EOL Learning + Education team will be on hand in the main exhibit area to answer any questions you may have about the creatures or plants you observe and uploading your pictures of them to Flickr for inclusion in EOL.

After your BioBlitz adventure, there are still plenty of ways to stay involved with EOL. Participants can tag images that others have contributed and make comments on species pages. Activities and podcasts related to BioBlitzes can be found at education.eol.org, so be sure to stay tuned.

The 2010 Biscayne National Park BioBlitz is of special significance as it coincides with International Year of Biodiversity, the worldwide celebration of life on earth and of the value of biodiversity for our lives. We look forward to seeing you there!

About Biscayne National Park: Biscayne National Park is one of 392 units of the National Park System ranging from Yellowstone to the Statue of Liberty. Miami's closest national park, Biscayne features crystal-clear water, islands, mangroves and coral reefs - a paradise for marine life, water birds, boaters, snorkelers and divers alike. More than a half million visitors come to this national park each year. More information can be found at www.nps.gov/bisc.

About Encyclopedia of Life: Encyclopedia of Life is an unprecedented effort that brings together several of the world's leading science institutions--Harvard University, the Field Museum of Natural History, the Marine Biological Laboratory, the Smithsonian Institution, the Biodiversity Heritage Library, and the Missouri Botanical Garden--all with the common goal to transform the science of biology and our understanding of life on Earth. It provides freely accessible information for users around the world about all of the 1.9 million known species on our planet. Please visit www.eol.org for more information.

Contact: Breen Byrnes
bbyrnes@eol.org
202-633-8730
Encyclopedia of Life