National Science Week

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.
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Meet your ACSA-Qld Committee

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…
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SEED Citizen Science Hub Launch

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…
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ALA presentation: underpinning citizen science in Australia

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

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…
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Environmental biosecurity webinar series – begins in 2 weeks

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…
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Changes to ACSA’s Member Portal

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…
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ACSA-QLD – Nominations close 24th May

ACSA-QLD – Nominations close 24th May

ACSA development
ACSA-QLD is seeking nominations to join its Chapter Management Committee! The Queensland Chapter of ACSA was launched January 2019, and is now looking to build a vibrant program for the state’s community of practice (and interest). If you have a role in citizen science in Queensland and some time and energy to offer, please consider getting involved by joining the ACSA-QLD Management Committee in one of the following roles: Chair Vice Chair Secretary / Treasurer (combined role) General Committee Members (x4) Descriptions of these roles are available here. To nominate, please complete and submit the form online. All Committee members must be (or must become) a subscribed member of ACSA. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact James Gullison on 0414 762 374 or via email j.gullison@griffith.edu.au. Nominations close…
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NESP Grants Open

NESP Grants Open

Uncategorized
The National Environmental Science Program (NESP) grants are open until 30 June 2020, seeking applicants to deliver research in applied environmental science to support decision-makers from across the Australian community. The program will be delivered through four thematic research hubs and seek to deliver national scale applied environmental research programs, but also strong engagement and outcomes with local communities. ACSA sees citizen science as a strong pathway to support these outcomes and is actively exploring opportunities to connect with bid consortia on collaborations and to communicate our identified research goals for our national Community of Practice. We would welcome any thoughts and ideas from our ACSA community on NESP engagement opportunities - please contact Amy.
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Mapping citizen science in Australia

Mapping citizen science in Australia

Uncategorized
Just before COVID-19 threatened to change the world as we know it, and as the bushfires started raging across the country, Dr Yaela Golumbic, who you may remember from her CitSciOz18 blog, had embarked on a journey to map citizen science in Australia. With help from many in this community, and responses from almost 100 citizen science project leaders, scientists and practitioners across Australia, this work has attracted much national and international interest. Initial findings from the research are now available in this participant report, providing a glimpse into the unique characteristics of our Australian citizen science community.
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