Year: 2020

As part of continued programming with the Network of the National Library of Medicine and the All of Us Research Program, SciStarter hosted an event series in January, February and March to help you get started in one of three citizen science projects that advance real world research. How It Works This “Lend Citizen Science […]

Every year around Christmas time, tens of thousands of volunteer birdwatchers gather in familiar locations across the Western Hemisphere for a tradition that dates back more than a century. On select days between December 14 and January 5, volunteers with the National Audubon Society’s Christmas Bird Count take a census of every bird they see […]

Hot off the (virtual) press…the Library & Community Guide to Citizen Science! Libraries are quickly becoming hubs for citizen science. Your library may already be involved in citizen science programming. If so, bravo! For countless others, citizen science is still a bit of a mystery. We created this guide to help you navigate the rapidly […]

In today’s world, computers both big and small produce vast volumes of data in record time — millions of trillions of bytes worth. It’s so much information that researchers can’t properly analyze all the data produced, and the overload can also lead computers to make mistakes. That’s why researchers are increasingly turning to citizen scientists […]

Air quality impacts our health, our quality of life and even the length of our lives. Most people don’t think about what’s in the air they breathe — but perhaps they should. That’s the driving force behind the Pakistan Air Quality Initiative. The citizen science project wants to let people know what’s in their air. […]

Guest Post by Sarah Jones Learn more about Budburst on SciStarter. Link to https://scistarter.org/budburst Join Communities Across the World in Observing Plant Life Cycles – Any Plant, Any Place, Any Time! I haven’t always loved plants. I loved the animals that took shelter in branches, eating leaves and fruits. I loved the lake surrounded by trees […]

In 2018, the Committee on Designing Citizen Science to Support Science Learning gathered at the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine to draft the 184-page report, Learning Through Citizen Science: Enhancing Opportunities by Design. (Darlene Cavalier, founder of SciStarter.org, was part of that committee.) The goal of the report “[was] to say something new […]

Guest Post by Lynn Chesnut (@ramblynn1) Citizen science projects address a wide variety of research needs from bee conservation to light pollution. This type of citizen science typically involves volunteers collecting data for projects created by “expert” scientists, and volunteer involvement often ends there. But there’s another citizen science. A citizen science that involves volunteers […]

Guest Post by Troi Perkins (@theTroi) Over the past decade, citizen science has come to the forefront of environmental conservation and education. There are many tools in citizen science that brings people together, but none can boast the far-reaching effects that BioBlitzes have. A “BioBlitz” is an event where groups of scientists, academic professionals, and […]

All for Science, Science for All Guest post by Lauren Ramilo @dimisitque Biotechnology has advanced rapidly in the past decade. New discoveries and technological advances have made it easier to manipulate living organisms to make new antibiotics or improve agricultural production. The equipment and materials needed for rigorous biological engineering are more affordable than ever, […]