2020 – Page 2 – Australian Citizen Science Association

14Aug 2020 by Amy Slocombe No Comments

National Science Week

Communication & promotion, Education, Engaging citizens, Meetings and Events

ACSA is proud to support Australia’s National Science Week (15-23 August). There will be a number of citizen science activities to mark the week. Remember these are all online so anyone can participate! 15/08: The Secret life of nudibranch (Gold Coast Libraries) 15/08: Get the GC Reef lowdown (Gold Coast Libraries) 17/08: Whales in the city with Dr Olaf (Humpbacks & High Rises) 17/08: Introducing citizen science to younger people (ACSA ACT & Region) 19/08: Lunimary Lecture: Whales in the city (Gold Coast Libraries) 20/08: What Makes Science Good? (The University of Adelaide) 25/08: The Science and Citizens of the Coorong (Murraylands & Riverland Landscape Board) For more citizen science Science Week activities please click here, and for a complete list of all the National Science Week activities please visit the official website.

13Aug 2020 by Amy Slocombe No Comments

Meet your ACSA-Qld Committee

ACSA development, Collaboration & partnerships

On Wednesday 12 August, a new Management Committee was elected to manage ACSA-QLD activities for the next two years. We are pleased to announce the following office bearers: CHAIR Janine Bedros Environmental Projects Manager, ECOllaboration VICE CHAIR Darryl Ebenezer Executive Officer, Queensland Land and Water Carers SECRETARY & TREASURER Luise Manning President, Springfield Lakes Nature Care Inc GOVERNMENT LIAISON Caitlin Syme Project Officer, Office of the Queensland Chief Scientist COMMITTEE MEMBER Jennifer Seevinck Senior Lecturer, Queensland University of Technology COMMITTEE MEMBER Cherie Bushell Student, University of the Sunshine Coast COMMITTEE MEMBER Cheryl Tan Molecular Biologist, coral reef survey diver If you are based in Queensland and would like to get…

17Jul 2020 by Amy Slocombe No Comments

SEED Citizen Science Hub Launch

Collaboration & partnerships, Communication & promotion, Meetings and Events

The NSW Department of Planning Industry and Environment has launched the SEED Citizen Science Hub to support and grow citizen science in NSW. The hub sits on the SEED (Sharing and Enabling Environmental Data) platform, which is an openly accessible and trusted platform for environmental data. The hub provides many benefits for scientists and data users, project organisers and participants alike, including project registration and promotion, networking and data access, interest from volunteers curious about projects in their local area or finding online projects they can contribute to from home. The hub increases the impact your contributions can have by being openly available to communities, scientists and decision makers. The hub harnesses the enthusiasm, interest and efforts of citizen scientists to enrich the range and depth of data available, to be used as part…

15Jul 2020 by Amy Slocombe No Comments

ALA presentation: underpinning citizen science in Australia

Collaboration & partnerships, Communication & promotion, Meetings and Events

ACSA-ACT & Region invites you to join a special online presentation by Peter Brenton of the Atlas of Living Australia (ALA). This presentation will provide an overview of the ALA, including the tools, services and information it provides. It will also cover the benefits to data providers in making their data freely available through the ALA. Time will also be allocated to a Q&A session were your ALA questions will be answered. Underpinning citizen science in Australia Presented by: Peter Brenton Date: 30 July 2020 Time: 7:30PM Format: Online (Zoom) Register here! The Atlas of Living Australia (ALA) is our national facility for biodiversity data, aggregating occurrence observations and other biodiversity information from thousands of sources into a standardised public access data repository which is used by the general public,…

15Jul 2020 by Amy Slocombe No Comments

Call for Papers: CSA Journal on Disaster, Infrastructure, and Participatory Knowledge

Collaboration & partnerships

There are many empirical cases of citizen and community science that start in response to disasters, but there is a dearth of analyses on its interaction with socio-technical infrastructures. Our sister association, Citizen Science Association (CSA) is producing a special issue of their journal, Citizen Science: Theory & Practice, which is inviting papers that bring attention to the ways infrastructure shapes how citizen and community science unfolds over longer periods of disaster recovery, whether and how infrastructure supports citizen and community science in translating participatory knowledge into meaningful and lasting institutional changes, and more. [caption id="attachment_18617" align="aligncenter" width="960"] Image: Fukushima by Pascal. Public domain on Flickr.[/caption] If you are interested in submitting a paper, full details are available on CSA's blog, including an overview of the topic and purpose of…

15Jul 2020 by Amy Slocombe No Comments

Environmental biosecurity webinar series – begins in 2 weeks

Communication & promotion, Meetings and Events

The Environmental Biosecurity Office (EBO) is excited to inform you about a new monthly environmental biosecurity webinar series beginning in two weeks. The monthly webinars will run during the last week of each month using Microsoft Teams, and will be held in place of the Environmental Biosecurity Roundtables for 2020. Each webinar will feature three keynote speakers and explore a particular theme relating to environmental biosecurity. The speaking sessions will run for no more than one hour and be followed by a half hour facilitated discussion for those who wish to dive deeper into the topic being discussed. If you have a spare 60 or (even better) 90 minutes a month, you may like to consider logging on for this engaging series! The EBO is planning to use the department’s…

26Jun 2020 by Amy Slocombe No Comments

Changes to ACSA’s Member Portal

ACSA development

ACSA recently sought suggestions from our members on how to improve the functionality and effectiveness of our website. Following this, we have decided to proceed with an initial upgrade to our Member Portal. Our new Member Portal will be a front-facing search facility, allowing people to search for a citizen science expert, communicate with others in a relevant field or increase their professional contacts list. This change should vastly increase the functionality of the portal and help provide the networking and connection opportunities that are so often requested. All ACSA members will have the opportunity to be profiled in this portal, and the wider community will be able to search through it. The portal will enable you to: Update your profile to advertise your skills and specialities to others; Search…

23Jun 2020 by Libby Hepburn No Comments

Global Citizen Science practitioners invited to contribute to UNESCO’s 2021 initiative to promote Open Science

Collaboration & partnerships, Communication & promotion, Social research in CS

Open Science, the movement working to make research more accessible and transparent, has been developing since the late 1990s. Citizen Science, has been developing in parallel and benefits from many of the technological advances that have allowed Open Science to flourish. As our networks have been working hard to raise the profile, understanding and uptake of Citizen Science so those encouraging the practice of Open Science have been doing the same with increasing success. Now with an understanding of the importance of the widespread collaboration of communities and science to address urgent planetary challenges, UNESCO has identified the need to encourage science to be more connected to societies’ needs and to offer real opportunities to allow everyone to participate and benefit from what science can offer. They have established a…

22May 2020 by Libby Hepburn No Comments

Citizen Science perspectives on Open Science – questionnaire

Collaboration & partnerships

UNESCO is developing a global policy and regulatory agenda on Open Science (UNESCO Recommendation on Open Science) that will include Citizen Science as one important pillar. We have created a Citizen Science & Open Science Community of Practice (CoP) within the Citizen Science Global Partnership to establish a cooperation with UNESCO on that initiative. The first request of this partnership with UNESCO is to produce a short paper by the end of May 2020. The paper shall reflect the Citizen Science perspective on Open Science and its development in future. If you would like to get involved in the Community of Practice, or to contribute to the paper, please contact Libby Heburn on 0458 798 990. For more information on the UNESCO Open Science agenda please click here.

19May 2020 by Michelle Neil 3 Comments

Putting a Citizen Science Stamp on it!

ACSA development, Collaboration & partnerships, Communication & promotion

By Michelle Neil At the end of March 2019 I had just returned from the USA Citizen Science Association’s Conference in Raleigh NC and I had just submitted my ACSA blog about my adventures. I was still buzzing about everyone I had met, the sheer volume of people (over 800!) that were at the Conference and how well citizen science was presented plus the funding and grant opportunities and global collaborations that we talked about. Yet back in Australia, I was frustrated. Despite the Australian Citizen Science Association’s (and my) best efforts, many Australians still didn’t know what citizen science is or how anyone can contribute to increase scientific knowledge. My husband, John, overheard my grumbling and, with the latest Australia Post Stamp Bulletin in hand, said, “You know what…

Year: 2020