Citizen Science

  • Author(s)
    Lynda Kelly
  • Category
    Museullaneous
  • Published
    11 September 2009
  • Read time
    2 minutes

The Centre for Advancement of Informal Science Education (CAISE) have released a report on 'citizen science'.

The CAISE Inquiry Group report states that "Citizen science projects contribute to awareness and understanding of key scientific concepts and excel in building interest in scientific activities and developing science-related skills. These are the conclusions suggested by the evidence from the recently completed CAISE Inquiry Group study of Public Participation in Scientific Research (PPSR) programs."

Citizen science is something we're looking at here in terms of some of our science communication projects. We will also be looking at the idea of "crowd-sourcing" as a way to seek public input to developing our Biodiversity program for 2010. Angelina Russo, my colleague from Swinburne University (Melbourne), has been writing about the implications of crowd sourcing for museum exhibition design on the Social Media and Cultural Communication blog.

Be interested in what others think - is "citizen science" a viable idea?