April 2020: Citizen Science Month and the PNR!

Posted by Nancy Shin on March 31st, 2020 Posted in: Citizen Science, Public Health, Public Libraries, Training & Education
Tags: april 2020, citizen science month, nnlm pnr

Welcome to Citizen Science Month at the PNR.  Thanks to the support of the National Library of Medicine (NLM), SciStarter – a web-based research affiliate of the School for the Future of Innovation in Society at the Arizona State University – is helping all kinds of libraries curate activities for Citizen Science Month.  In fact, the activities that PNR is doing for Citizen Science Month 2020 are inspired by SciStarter’s collaboration with the NLM.  Citizen Science Month promotes all things citizen science which range from amazing discoveries to inspiring projects that are all citizen science-related!

What is citizen science?  Citizen science connects research scientists and everyday people to help accelerate research and discovery.  Yes, this means that anybody can become a citizen scientist and make an impact on society by contributing to groundbreaking research!  Next question, “Where can I get started?” To help, throughout the month of April, NNLM PNR’s Citizen Science Team is curating a Dragonfly blog series on different types of environmental health or health-focused citizen science projects that you can do with your library patrons virtually throughout the year and especially during Citizen Science Month.

Each week, we will highlight  a new citizen science project that you and your library patrons can do from the comforts of home; these citizen science projects come from the SciStarter/NLM microsite which feature half a dozen health-related citizen science projects.  PNR’s Citizen Science Month will wrap with an exciting PNR Rendezvous webinar, “What’s all this talk about citizen science?” featuring  SciStarter founder Darlene Cavalier, and two high school teachers from Oregon, who will share their experience working with their students and families on citizen science projects.

Here’s PNR’s Citizen Science Month schedule for April 2020:

Week 1 (April 1-3) – Welcome to Citizen Science Month 2020 Dragonfly Blog (Nancy Shin)
Week 2  (April 6-10)– “COVID-19” Citizen Science Project Dragonfly Blog (Michele Spatz)
Week 3 (April 13-17) – “Flu Near You” Citizen Science Project Dragonfly Blog (Nancy Shin)
Week 4 (April 20-24)– “What’s in Your Backyard?”  Citizen Science Project Dragonfly Blog
(Emily Hamstra)
Week 5 (April 27- 30) –  “Stallcatchers” Citizen Science Project Dragonfly Blog (Michele Spatz)
“What all this talk about citizen science?” PNR Rendezvous webinar (April 29^th, 2020)

We here at the PNR hope you enjoy our blog series throughout the month of April and our webinar entitled “What all this talk about citizen science?” on April 29^th, 2020.  Happy 2020 Citizen Science Month!!!

ABOUT Nancy Shin
I received my Bachelor of Science in the Integrated Sciences majoring in medical genetics and animal biology from the University of British Columbia (UBC). I also graduated from UBC's esteemed MLIS program with a focus on health librarianship. In 2018, I was the Research Data Management Sewell Fund Fellow for the Technology Incubator at Washington State University. Currently, I'm the NNLM Region 5's Outreach and Data Coordinator for the University of Washington's Health Sciences Library. In my spare time, I enjoy photography, drawing, cooking and baking, and travelling the world!!!

Email author View all posts by Nancy Shin