From the 2014 AAAS Annual Meeting

Greetings again. I hope you’re doing well.

As noted in the latest Resource of the Week post, I recently returned from the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) annual meeting. The meeting was in Chicago. Despite the cold weather, my graduate students and I enjoyed attending.

The meeting had attendees from more than 50 countries, and it included sessions on many topics in science. In keeping with the meeting’s theme (“Meeting Global Challenges: Discovery and Innovation”), many sessions had international aspects.

Likewise, many sessions regarded the communication of science. Among them were the following:

• a set of sessions on promoting engagement with science
• a panel on integrating oral-communication training into graduate education
• a panel on use of “teen cafés” to engage young people with science
• a session on a film for the public about Fermilab
• a career workshop on AuthorAID
• a lecture in which actor Alan Alda gave advice on communicating with the public about science

At the meeting, the National Association of Science Writers (NASW) had a science communication internship fair for students of science communication. It also had a science writing mentorship program. I enjoyed being one of the mentors at the meeting.

Other communication-related aspects of the meeting included

• a newsroom where reporters could work on stories about the meeting
• a reception honoring recipients of the AAAS Kavli Science Journalism Awards
• many additional career workshops on science communication and other topics
• many exhibits by scientific institutions, book publishers, and others

To learn more about the meeting, please see its website.

Until the next post—

Barbara