CONNECTION: A Workshop to Make Your Science Communication
More Effective through “Critical Storytelling”
Organized by: Jonathan H. Sharp (University of Delaware) and Adrienne Sponberg (ASLO)
See the trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_KIA8nx3LQ&feature=youtu.be
TO REGISTER: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/2015Connection
LOCATION: Andalucia 2 (Floor 1) of Granada Congress Center
Why is it that Much of the Public Does Not Believe in Climate Change and then Another Faction Avoids Vaccinations? Whether interacting with the lay public, local policymakers, or fellow researchers, relaying technical information accurately while keeping an audience engaged is a critical skill. An all too common perception about scientists is that they are tedious, boring, and unlikeable. Since we are experts on science issues important to society, often we assume audiences await our gems of knowledge. In the words of Mark Twain: “with parted lips and bated breath the audience hung upon his words”. However, lay public audiences do not hang upon our words, local policy makers are often unimpressed, and even our science peers will tune us out if the presentation is not interesting.
Effective Communication is Needed. For many scientists, presentations are sometimes seen as requirements to suffer through. This is often because you are required to communicate your work, but never taught how to effectively do so.
And, sadly, if you cannot impart the results and recommendations of your work in a way that will yield action, your work will have little impact in the world outside of your own lab.
This workshop will help you improve communications skills so you can present your work more effectively. Storytelling/narrative structure is at the core of virtually all effective broad communication. For obvious commercial reasons the Hollywood entertainment industry has traditionally been the source of both innovation and perfection of narrative elements, yet their basic approach is equally applicable to the communication of science to all audiences, from the general public to academics. For the past five years, scientist-turned-filmmaker Randy Olson has been developing an approach he calls “critical storytelling,” bringing together the broadly creative energy of Hollywood with the rigorous discipline and commitment to accuracy of the science world. He has come to ASLO meetings and brought others from Hollywood to help us develop more interesting and effective communication skills.
The Connection Workshop in Granada. Interested meeting attendees will participate in one of two 3-hour workshops scheduled for Sunday before the formal opening of the 2015 Aquatics Sciences Meeting. The format will be similar to workshops held at the 2013 Aquatic Sciences Meeting and the 2104 Ocean Sciences meeting. The workshop will feature the experienced communication specialist, Brian Palermo. In addition to acting in many Hollywood movies and TV series, he is an instructor at the premier Improv theater in Los Angeles, The Groundlings. Working with Randy Olson and actress/screenwriting consultant, Dorie Barton, he has helped us in 2012 and 2013 with video workshops as well as helping create and then presenting the 2013 Connection workshop. Participation in one of the Connection workshop sessions will be limited and prior registration will be required (no fee).
Brian will facilitate this through a hands-on, experiential workshop where you will participate in exercises designed to help improve your presentational abilities. We will focus on how to “act” throughout your presentation so that your audience remains engaged and how to create a recognizable structure for each presentation so that it tells a relatable story.
Your science does not have to be “dumbed down” to be effectively communicated to others outside of your specific discipline. But there are communication tools — learned through improvisational theatre games — that can be employed as a syringe with which to inject the more challenging aspects of your work into the hearts and minds of your audience. (That is not a mistake. Having your message reach the hearts of your audience is how you will spread your message more effectively. Think of the anti-vaccination movement in America. That is misinformation distributed widely by evoking emotion in the audience. Science communicators could learn much from this paradigm and use it to spread factual information.)
And the workshop has been empirically proven to be fun!
Why Participate? It is our hope that improved communication skills will assist the aquatic science community in reaching out to explain the results of our research. These skills are needed to better reach lay audiences, elected officials, and resource managers. Unless we can learn how to better connect to these groups, the benefits of our research are lost to society. The workshop registration is open to anyone interested; we hope to attract graduate students, early career scientists, and also established scientists. While not everyone can become a super star speaker, almost everyone can improve his/her skills. Financial support for this workshop has been received from the Ocean Sciences Division of the US National Science Foundation.
Register. There will be two sessions on Sunday, February 22; one from 10:00-13:00 and the other at 14:00-17:00, both in Andalucia 2 (Floor 1) at the Granada Congress Center. To register, go to: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/2015Connection
Box lunches for participants in both sessions will be available in the meeting room from 13:00 – 14:00.
Participation in the workshop is limited, so, please be committed to attend if you register. For more information and updates, periodically check this webpage.