Bringing Scientists and Stakeholders Together through ScienceTapes (Alaska Voices) Active

Communities, state and federal agencies, resource managers, and decision makers throughout Alaska need sound scientific information to better understand our changing world to make informed, science-based decisions that will shape the future. Scientists also need information from these stakeholders to understand what science questions need to be answered, develop research priorities, and gain important insight about the landscape based on personal experiences and generational knowledge. However, effective two-way conversations between scientists and stakeholders are often limited, due to resource constraints, a lack of necessary communication skills and tools, and other factors.

 

A mechanism for better communication between scientists and stakeholders is needed to facilitate the successful exchange of scientific information. This project aims to address this need by developing the ScienceTapes project, an initiative to record and archive conversations between research scientists and non-scientists in order to share science stories to build connections between people, science, and the environment to create a greater understanding of change in Alaska’s llandscapes.

 

The project team is partnering with StoryCorps and has trained a group of volunteers to facilitate effective conversations between two people. The volunteers then participated in facilitating, recording and archiving the conversations. Since the initial training period ScienceTapes has set up listening stations at events and conferences across Alaska. The team has facilitated over 60 conversations, with 49 currently archived with StoryCorps and the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. ScienceTapes has recorded conversations with a wide-array of people, including research scientists, students ( from elementary to graduate level), decision makers, resource managers, engineers, rural community members, politicians, Alaskan elders (rural and urban), film makers, and media personnel. 

 

Several of the recordings from the first year have been processed into shorter pieces that can be accessed on the project’s pilot website (www.sciencetapes.org). The project coordinators also intend to create a model for science communication that can be applied to a variety of other science communication needs in the larger science community. As the ScienceTapes team moves past its collaboration and partnership with StoryCorps, the focus of the project will be expanded. Finally, to increase the accessibility to the Alaskan public (e.g., non-scientists), the ScienceTapes project will become an initiative, or sub-project, of a larger umbrella project called “AlaskaVoices.”