Blog: Citizen Science Projects, People, and Perspectives
By Colleen Henn and Mara Dias, Jun 05, 2020
In 1984, a small group of California surfers were fed up with the development and water pollution at their favorite break, Malibu’s Surfrider Beach. They took their environmental concerns to California State Parks officials — and prevailed. The Surfrider Foundation was born. Since then, the nonprofit has kept its focus on improving coastal water quality. … Read more “The Government is Scaling Back Water Quality Protections. These Surfers are Picking up the Slack”
Categories: Citizen Science, Ecology & Environment
By Caroline Nickerson, May 30, 2020
This post was originally published as a SciStarter newsletter. Sign up to receive bi-weekly citizen science in your inbox! Dear SciStarter Class of 2020: Congratulations! You should be proud of the many contributions to science you’ve made this year, despite facing enormous challenges. SciStarter members, fortified by the addition of nearly 18,000 freshmen this school year … Read more “To the SciStarter Class of 2020 (that’s you!)”
Categories: EarthSchool, Global Citizen Science Month, In the News, Newsletter
By Eric Betz,
A few years ago, Alvaro Antonio Vanegas, a software engineer and avid cyclist, got tired of the air pollution problems in his hometown of Bogota, Colombia. He decided to join forces with an activist already researching the problem, Daniel Bernal, who he’d heard was building his own rudimentary air quality sensors and using them to … Read more “Can This Cheap, DIY Pollution Sensor Help the World Get Clean Air?”
Categories: Citizen Science, Environment
By SciStarter Team, May 26, 2020
Today, over 1.5 billion children are unable to go to school. Beyond public health and the economy, coronavirus is disrupting how we engage and educate younger generations — and a group of global environmental education experts have started a program to help. TED Education, The United Nations Environmental Programme and many other partners launched Earth … Read more “Kids at Home? Earth School Wants to Send Them on a Nature ‘Quest’”
Categories: Citizen Science, Nature & Outdoors, Other
By Vivienne Byrd, Darlene Cavalier, and Caroline Nickerson, May 21, 2020
A version of this post was originally published on the Citizen Science Association Blog. First: thank you. Even with the unprecedented challenges, so many of you came together to make Global Citizen Science Month 2020 (April) a success. We are crunching numbers and assessing formative and summative evaluations so we can share a comprehensive report. … Read more “Preliminary Outcomes from CitSciMonth 2020”
Categories: Citizen Science Month, Events
By Andrea Dautant,
Plastic pollution in our oceans is a major, on-going global crisis. Researchers estimate that 8 million tons of plastic end up in the ocean every year. Much of the plastic is dumped carelessly, on land or in rivers, and then carried or blown into the sea. Nearly 700 species, including endangered ones, are already known … Read more “To Fight Plastic Pollution, These Researchers Want Your Pictures of Beach Trash”
Categories: Animals, Citizen Science, Nature & Outdoors, Other
By Caroline Nickerson, May 20, 2020
Educators, parents, and lifelong learners joined Jill Nugent and the SciStarter team each Thursday at 8:00 PM ET during April’s Citizen Science Month for a five-part education webinar series. These webinars focused on sharing citizen science projects that are a great fit for the science learning environment, with an emphasis on projects that our distributed … Read more “Citizen Science Month Education Webinar Series”
Categories: Citizen Science Month, EarthSchool, Education, Events
By Bob Hirshon, May 17, 2020
This post was originally published as a SciStarter newsletter. Sign up to receive bi-weekly citizen science in your inbox! New Projects Are Springing Up! Spring has finally sprung, along with signs of new growth everywhere — including here at SciStarter, where new projects are popping up all over. Here, we highlight some of our favorite new … Read more “Fun, new projects we think you’ll love!”
Categories: Newsletter
By Molly Schools, May 12, 2020
Kids and adults both coo at the sight of a crawling caterpillar. We imagine that this hungry caterpillar may flutter past someday as a beautiful butterfly. Caterpillars and other insects with segmented bodies are called arthropods. And scientists need your help with a citizen science project aimed at understanding how these insects’ populations are changing. … Read more “How Counting Caterpillars Can Help Scientists Understand Climate Change”
Categories: Animals, Citizen Science, Ecology & Environment, Insects, Nature & Outdoors
By Jess Fraser, May 08, 2020
Learn more about Chasing Steve on SciStarter. When Leah Mallen and I headed to Alberta, Canada to film a documentary about aurora chasers who had discovered a new phenomenon in the night sky, we didn’t know what to expect. As Canadians, we knew that auroras were light displays caused by solar wind. We’d heard of … Read more “Chasing Steve: A Mystery in the Night Sky”
Categories: Astronomy & Space, In the News
