Category: AAPS News

The Citizen Science Association is a new and rapidly growing organization with many new names and faces. Some of those faces are volunteering their time to lead this organization as Board Members. We’re going to post a series of blogs over the coming months called “Meet the Board”, where you can learn more about the great people guiding the organization. In this blog, you'll meet Kris Stepenuck. Kris spent 14 years coordinating a volunteer stream monitoring program, Water Action Volunteers, for the State of Wisconsin. Recently, she began working with the University of Vermont Lake Champlain Sea Grant program. Her…

Having a flexible structure for a project is necessary for engaging different participants with different levels of familiarity, interest, trust, confidence, and skill with scientific investigation. Providing a variety of ways to participate helps practitioners and participants find common ground. Although the ultimate goal of a PPSR project may be data collection, it may take time with a number of scaffolding activities to develop the interest and confidence necessary to collect and submit data for scientific analysis. These scaffolding activities may be outside of the PPSR project. It takes practitioners, participants, and local leaders working together to come to a…

Washington, D.C. ­­(March 23rd, 2015)– Citizen science received some high level attention today when plans were unveiled to install a new rain gauge in the First Lady’s Kitchen Garden. This rain gauge represents far more than just a Pennsylvania Avenue data point for the Community Collaborative Rain, Hail and Snow (CoCoRaHS), a citizen science network of over 20,000 active participants who serve as the largest source of daily precipitation data in the United States. Announced in conjunction with the White House Science Fair, this commitment points to high-level recognition of citizen science as a powerful platform for science education. CoCoRaHS…

Membership has voted to approve the first Board of Directors for the Citizen Science Association. We are pleased to introduce the slate of twelve: Tom Baker Rick Bonney Darlene Cavalier Nolan Doesken Mary Ford Muki Haklay Eric Jolly Rebecca Jordan Greg Newman Raj Pandya Kris Stepenuck Martin Storksdieck Short biographies and personal statements from each member are available here. Voting indicated a 95% rate of approval for the slate, with a 37% rate of participation in the election. Comments on the process were much appreciated, and are being synthesized to share with the new Board. Board members will be in…

From the Nominating Committee: On November 4th, all Citizen Science Association members should have received an email ballot to vote on the slate for the CSA's inaugural Board. We hope everyone takes this responsibility seriously and exercise the right to have your voice heard. We would again like to thank everyone for the thoughtful nominations for the inaugural Board. This community is truly fortunate to have so many highly qualified people willing to serve. From the nominations received, we have put together a slate of twelve potential Board members that we feel can provide the guidance needed to foster our…

We are currently soliciting nominations to serve on the first Board of Directors for the newly forming Citizen Science Association (CSA). As you may know, CSA is in its first year as a membership organization, with over 2,000 members registered. CSA's specific mission is to "advance citizen science through communication, coordination, and education." In order to accomplish this important mission, CSA will need outstanding leadership. We are seeking individuals to collectively represent a diversity of expertise and experience to move CSA forward. Areas of interest include citizen science programs and activities, financial planning and management, prior experience serving on non-profit…