During the week of May 15th, I traveled to St. Paul, Minnesota, to attend and present at the 2017 Citizen Science Association Conference. Alex Fries and Suzi Spitzer from IAN also attended the conference. Check out Suzi’s awesome blogs on the conference. St. Paul is the capital of Minnesota and adjoins Minneapolis, which is the largest city in Minnesota. While the combined St. Paul-Minneapolis population is 3.52 million (Wikipedia), St.

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On April 24th, 2017, Dave Nemazie and I began our journey to Rio de Janeiro. Little did we know, instead of taking 18 hours to get there, it would take 30. We flew through JFK, and a delayed flight meant we missed our connection to Rio. After spending the day in New York, we finally arrived a day after we were supposed to. Despite our travel woes, we made it to Rio and had productive meetings with our partners, Guido Gelli and Marlus Newton.

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In a previous blog, I suggested six elements for science synthesis that we have employed in the Submerged Aquatic Vegetation Synthesis (SAV SYN) effort. These six elements were the following: • Experienced leadership … • Limited size … • Multiple immersive workshops … • Regular communication … • Flexibility … • Product focus … I also discussed the following enabling conditions:

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During the month of April, I had an opportunity to present at Scientific Literacy: A conference for reform-minded science educators, hosted by graduate students at the University of Rochester Warner School of Education.

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We recently gathered the submerged aquatic vegetation synthesis team (SAV SYN) at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science Annapolis office. This fourth and final working group meeting was convened to make progress on our two remaining publications, using Structural Equation Modeling (led by Jon Lefcheck) and seagrass trait analysis (led by Chris Patrick). The other major effort was to develop a segment analysis of SAV trends, drivers and factors affecting projections.

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'How’s the Beach?' is an app that presents health advisories to the public about bacterial levels in Myrtle Beach, SC and Sarasota Beach, FL. The University of South Carolina and IAN are collaborating to expand the scope of this app to include popular waterways and shellfish harvesting sites around the Charleston Harbor.

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In May I attended the 2017 Citizen Science Association Conference with Caroline and Alex. This blog is the second post about the conference, and the first part can be found here. On the final morning of the conference, I took advantage of the clear skies and dry sidewalks, and woke up early to explore Saint Paul.

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Last month I attended the 2017 Citizen Science Association Conference with Caroline and Alex, from May 17 to 19. The three-day biennial conference was hosted in Saint Paul, Minnesota at the RiverCentre. The conference proved to be very educational and thought-provoking, and I especially appreciated the opportunity to network with other members of the diverse and expanding citizen science community.

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The theme for the 2017 Gulf of Mexico Summit is “One Gulf” … The theme of the State of the Gulf of Mexico Summit this year in Houston was “One Gulf” and was all about synthesis of science to create positive restoration outcomes. I served on a panel with Mark Harwell and Jack Gentile to discuss our work on the Texas coast Report Card project, and our larger ambition for a Gulf of Mexico Report Card.

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After participating in the March for Science I was hesitant to join in on yet another march in the same week. The March for Science, while inspiring and exciting, was still a very cold, wet, and tiring day. But when I found out that my 86-year-old grandfather wanted to participate in the People’s Climate March, I couldn’t not go.

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