Myth-busting the barriers to public engagament

Right now I should really be focusing on writing my thesis, but when I heard about an opportunity to spend a day discussing public engagement at the University of Birmingham I just couldn't resist... Especially when I saw that Professor Alice Roberts would be presenting - after finishing my placement with the radio show, a number of people have asked me if I want to be "the next Alice Roberts" so I thought I'd go along to find out the answer! 

The event was hosted in the mid-renovation Lapworth museum: a light and airy space that had a much more open atmosphere than the dark confines of a seminar room or lecture theatre. This meant that throughout the day I felt much more open to asking questions of the speakers. 

We heard from researchers at the university - each tackling a common barrier to public engagement. It was interesting to hear all the different examples, and their (sometimes conflicting) experiences of the support from the university media team. 

A very informative workshop from Paul Manners followed, looking at the case studies submitted to the research excellence framework (or REF - it's what university research departments are judged on). The national coordinating centre for public engagement had looked at all the case studies and analysed which had contained public engagement. It was an interesting review, and showed what kind of content a case study on a public engagement activity would need to have to qualify as "4 star". 

After some more myth-busting examples, we were joined by the pro-vice chancellor Tim Softley, who spoke about the cultural change that was needed, and happening, within the university to develop its engagement activities. 

We then heard the bureaucratic side of the story, from Jenni Chambers of the RCUK before she joined Tim, Paul and Alice Roberts for a panel discussion. This was really interesting, and covered a number of points, including how engagement could (or should) be measured, and whether schools and the local communities also required cultural change for enagement to be successful. 

The final session of the day was Alice Roberts, who engaged us all, even after technical problems meant she had to do without her powerpoint slides. She tackled the problem of image: that of the "mad scientist", and what we can do to reach out and change that perception. She spoke of the importance of removing labels: whether it be labeling a GCSE student as a "scientist" or "non-scientist", or a recent trend of the use of the word "geek". 

I found the event really engaging (ha!) and definitely a worthwhile escape from my life of thesis writing. I aim to help the public engagement group at Birmingham by writing up some of my activities for them to post on their blog, so I can act as a point of contact for other researchers looking to do the same. Watch this space! 

Naked Scientists: Week 6

Week Six:

I've been a bit useless at keeping this blog updated...

Since starting at the Naked Scientists, I've interviewed people about beetles, magnetic materials, runners' high, lorries and slippery steel!

This week I somehow managed to be super efficient. In a flurry of activity between 4:30 and 6 on Monday afternoon I managed to get one of Chris' interviews scheduled and mine booked in for first thing Tuesday morning. This meant I was essentially one day ahead of myself all week which gave me a good opportunity to focus on planning my show.

I made quite a lot of phone calls to researchers in different areas trying to get and idea of what i should cover when discussing big data, and how to do this without any of the sections of my show repeating themselves. I also took a trip into Cambridge for the Festival of Ideas to see Data Shadow: one of their art exhibitions on personal data and privacy. It was really interesting, and prompted me to think twice about logging onto unknown wifi networks.

Week 5 at the Naked Scientists

After a rather disastrous week working on my PhD at the neutron beam source just south of Oxford I returned to the Naked Scientists (without the keys to my room in Cambridge, but that's another story...). 

This week there were loads of news stories,  and a lot of it from the UK, so we were busy doing research calls and arranging interviews. Unfortunately the researcher for the paper I was looking into was on sabbatical, so I was left searching for a local commentator.

As the paper was on materials chemistry, and that’s my area of research, I persuaded one of the post-doctoral researchers from my department to speak to me about the paper. It felt a bit weird doing an interview like this, knowing that you both knew the same information about the paper, but it was good experience to give something new a go.

I also did some research calls for my show, and it’s definitely starting to come together! 

Naked Scientists: Week 3

Week 3

After spending the weekend exploring Cambridge, Sunday saw my first visit to the BBC Cambridgeshire studio for our live show. I was expecting a dark underground room, but it's a nice airy studio and we'd filled it with lots of guests for our Q & A show. I had a lot of fun updating the twitter account with the answers our panel were giving to the varied questions sent in by our audience. 

Another Monday, and another collection of interesting news from around the globe to choose from. Alongside publishing online some of the news pieces from last week, I arranged to talk to one researcher in Canada and another in the USA. Both were great, and by the end of Monday I’d arranged interviews for both Chris and myself. 

An addition to a normal Monday was a request from BBC Cambridgeshire for a Naked Scientist to talk about a news story on their drivetime programme at 5:45. As is becoming usual, I volunteered! Graihagh and I chose a research paper that had come out that day on a research project that studied the UK Biobank data to see if there was a genetic influence on lung health and its relationship with smoking. It was a really interesting paper, and I had about an hour to prepare to talk about it on live radio! I felt much more prepared for this much shorter slot than for last week’s phone in, so it went much better. (Or at least that’s what I was told!) 

On Tuesday I managed to get my interview done, although had some real challenges with the studio connections. I ended up chatting to him for quite a while, which I knew would make my editing job harder! I then went to the #Camscicomm social, and met some more locals interetsed in science communication.

After Wednesday’s meeting. I attacked the edit and managed to get it down to the right time. I then put some time into starting to plan my show. 

As interns, we’re given the opportunity to produce one show on our own. This means we can choose the topic for the back end, as well as being in charge of collating any news stories for that week.

I had originally wanted to plan my show around renewable energy, but once I had mentioned my work with POST last year on big data, everyone seemed to get a bit excited. So I got in contact with my supervisor from POST, to ask her for any tips on interviewees.

The main problem is having too many ideas! As usual…

I’d also been put in charge of organising “Question of the Week” for next week, so started looking for appropriate experts who could help answer the question sent in by a listener. If anyone knows the wind speed needed to blow over a lorry then get in touch!

Thursday sees the writing of the news article to accompany the audio news piece, and this week a group lunch to say goodbye to one of the interns. I was particularly restrained and only had 2 pieces of cheesecake…

Friday began by finding out my new piece was in the script for the 5live science show. This was quite exciting! I don't think I'll be listening live at 5am, but definitely one for iplayer.

Week 2 with The Naked Scientists

Monday began as it did last week: searching for news. We found a lot of interesting stories, and divided them between us. We all struggled today, as most of the stories came from the USA, and so there was a lot of waiting for people on the other side of the world to wake up!

The portable recording equipment

On Tuesday it became apparent that a few of the stories weren’t going to work out, so I called a researcher from Cambridge whose paper we had seen a press release for on the university website. The phone call did not turn out as I wanted it to, and instead of doing a research call I ended up booking a face to face interview with her for that afternoon! This prompted some speedy tuition on how to use the mobile recording equipment (right), and some less speedy navigation around Cambridge to find the zoology building.

I made it through the construction site and eventually found the reception. I was then led down to the “beetle lab” where rows of boxes of soil (and beetles!) were kept in cupboards. It was on the walk down that I discovered the professor had actually been on Radio 4’s Today programme that morning talking about her research! No pressure for her next interviewer then…

We got down to the lab and, after brushing the beetle off my chair; I sat down and set up the recording equipment. Everything worked: result!

The interview went OK – she was excellent as she’d prepared answers for the questions from Radio 4, but I could have done a bit better. It’s definitely harder when you’re doing the interview face to face.

After another navigational fail, I made it back to the office and successfully uploaded the audio from the interview before calling a potential interviewee for Kat in the states. That all went OK so I went home on Tuesday feeling pretty good!

Me getting nervous before my live Q&A!

The last one to leave the building

Wednesday morning saw the group meeting and editing my piece. Chris then mentioned that he had a regular slot that evening on BBC Radio Norfolk where he answered science questions live from the public. And that he would like an intern to go along with him. Guess who volunteered! I couldn’t decide if I was excited or terrified, but it did mean I spent most of the rest of the day fretting. I did manage to get my news piece finished before heading down to the studio and dialling up Chris.

We were soon live on radio! I was quite nervous at first, which I’m sure you can tell, but as soon as I got a question I knew the answer to I relaxed. I am very glad I did it, but I’m not sure I would have said that at the time. You can listen here, starting at 2hrs10 ish.

Thursday saw some final editing tweaks and then writing up the story to a news article. I discovered (too late) that you should never re-record questions and cut them back in. This prevents any chance of twisting what your interviewee has said. For me, this meant re-doing the edit I had spent Wednesday afternoon doing! The end result was worth it though, and I was pleased with the edit. It didn't make the news for 5live, but it has been published as a special. Thanks to Rebecca Kilner for talking to me!

Week 1 as a Naked Scientist

The Naked Scientists are an award-winning broadcast organisation that produce weekly shows, articles, news stories and special podcasts. Thanks to funding from The Royal Academy of Engineering I am about to embark on an 8-week internship with them - keep reading to find out how I get on. 

The week before I was due to start at the Naked Scientists, I was at conference in Rio de Janeiro on the subject of Chemical Challenges in Renewable Energy. At the conference, I met a previous Naked Scientist, Ben Valsler, who was able to give me a bit of an insight before I started. I’m very glad for this; as he warned me that I would be starting very much from the word go, including helping out for their live radio shows on Sunday evenings. It was pretty exciting to hear about all the different things I would be doing, but it did involve some last minute rearrangements as I’d only planned to live in Cambridge Monday to Friday! 

So, arriving in from Rio at 17:30 the day before starting was perhaps an error, compounded by traffic on the motorway from Birmingham, meant I arrived half an hour late and without the one thing I needed (my passport) on my first day! This all turned out to be fine and I was quickly introduced to one full time member of the team (Graihagh) and the 3 other interns who had been there for varying periods of time already. We’re based in a large country house, Madingley hall, in a nice green area north west of Cambridge.

Every Monday morning there is a group meeting run by the producer for that week to determine which news stories will be covered. They then get distributed among the team. You might get a topic that you will end up leading an interview on, or you might be asked to research a paper that someone else will cover instead. Either way, you start by trying to get in contact with an author for the paper. This can be challenging if they are working in a country with a considerable time difference! You then need to have a conversation with them and work out if you think they are suited to being an interviewee. Can they describe their research clearly and enthusiastically? Before agreeing to definitely interview them, we ask for a sound check, so that the listeners will be able to hear them clearly.

In my first week, I wouldn’t be interviewing anyone for the show, so I did a couple of research calls to “scout out” potential interviewees for other people. I was lucky, as both of the people I contacted were happy to talk and very good at communicating. They also sent through pretty good sound checks.

My job for the week would be to write one of the short news articles and I found the most challenging part of this choosing a topic! Overwhelmed by the number of new articles published this week, by the end of the day I had only managed to get my shortlist down to 5.

Tuesday morning saw me return to my shortlist and get started on my news article. I needed to contact the paper author and arrange an interview. I would then record the interview so I could have accurate quotes, and get some practice in using the studio and editing for next week.

My usual inability to make decisions struck again, and so I made two article frameworks and sent off emails to the corresponding paper authors. One of them was pretty prompt at replying, so I arranged to speak to him on Wed afternoon. 

I then went down to the studio (out of the estate, and just down the road) to have a look as another intern went down to do a recording. It’s a small room in the zoology building, with a microphone and some sliding knobs. It looks complicated, but when you know which buttons to press, it actually is quite simple. The key point is to make sure it’s recording properly!

All of the shows are transcribed, and it’s our job to check through them before they go online, to make sure they match the audio that accompanies them. 

I also had a meeting with the managing editor, Chris, who ran through the day to day runnings of the group, and asked me whether I had any specific aims for the placement. It was good to talk to him, and it seems that the opportunities available are limitless!

The Naked Scientists have a group meeting every Wednesday morning, to discuss the previous week’s show and the items for the coming weekend. This was really interesting - hearing what Chris and his team want from a topic, and the different ways they can be presented. I mentioned that I had felt a good pre-arrival intern guide would have been great, and so managed to get myself assigned the task of creating one! I also arrived in to an e-mail from the other potential interviewee, so ended up deciding to make both of the news stories into articles.

For everyone else, the rest of Wednesday was a day of editing like mad to get the news articles finished before the deadline at the end of the day. I finished off my news articles and in the afternoon had my first interviews. The first one was a bit of a disaster: I had no idea I started every question by saying “Umm... So...” and how having a microphone in my face would make me unable to talk normally. But once that was over, the second one was much more relaxed and I was able to have a really interesting conversation with the researcher.

Thursday for me was my first chance at editing – I went through both of my interviews and took out all the “umm”s and “so”s from both me and my interviewees. This is a strangely satisfying experience when you get it right and just as frustrating when you don’t! The challenge is getting a 15 minute interview down to less than 5 minutes of airtime. I was quite pleased with the work up of my second interview by the time I was finished, and wished I had recorded it properly so I could submit it as a news article. It has made me look forward to next week’s opportunity. I also did some odd bits to help out other people, like booking a meet and greet for one of our guests who will be speaking live from a different location on Wednesday, and trying to track down some information from a researcher in France.

During my time here, one of the permanent staff Georgia will be acting as my “mother hen”. Essentially, she will be my first point of contact if I have any questions about anything. On Thursday afternoon she was able to listen to my interview and also read my two news articles. She was very positive about them, but also gave me some really useful feedback. It’s only when you go through something with someone that you really understand what kind of output they are looking for. After some edits and hunting for pictures, my articles were ready to go online – you can find one on why cavefish have no eyes here and another one on a record breaking artificial leaf here. After this week, I really can’t wait to get started next week on a piece to go into the news.

Professor John Loughhead, Chief Scientific Advisor for DECC comes to Birmingham

Yesterday, the chief scientific advisor for DECC, Professor John Loughhead, came to Birmingham to speak as the first in a series of lectures run by the Birmingham Energy Institute. 
Before the lecture, there was the opportunity to attend a student Q&A session, which I signed up for as soon as I heard about it! 

I arrived to discover there were only 12 of us in the Q&A, so an ideal opportunity for us to ask Professor Loughhead our questions in a much more personal environment. There were students from a range of research backgrounds, which led to a nice variety in the questions asked. From small modular nuclear reactors, to onshore wind subsidies via Electric Vehicle uptake and carbon labelling we covered most of the main areas of a future UK energy system. I, of course, asked about hydrogen and it's part of the UK's future. Professor Loughhead agreed that the technology is very attractive, mainly because there are no emissions at point of use. However, whilst there is still the option to buy petrol/diesel cars, there needs to be additional advantages to ownership: people don't like to be different. Maybe even the support of a Hollywood star would shift the balance...?

Throughout the session, Professor Loughhead was very personable and answered (or at least, tried to answer) all our questions: even when asked whether DECC, and himself, actually had any influence over governmental decisions! 

After a quick chat with us over a cup of tea, we all went upstairs to be joined by a theatre full of people to hear his lecture. Beginning by admitting he had one of the best jobs in the world, he then went on to speak about the UK's targets as set by the Climate Change Act, and how DECC was helping the UK get to these targets. 

He stressed the need for new technologies, and encouraged us students to get back to the lab! However, we were warned of the uncertainty of the energy system (including oil price fluctuations) and how this can be a massive turn-off for investors.

There were some really interesting graphs in his presentation, including one showing the reduction in research and development funding in energy research that occurred towards the end of the 1980s, and which is only just starting to rise. 

To finish, he stressed that innovation is not just needed in technology, but also business models and markets. 

It was a great talk, with an excellent opportunity before hand to discuss individual issues with the speaker. I look forward to the next in the lecture series!