Science advocacy

Last week, I attended the GSA Drosophila Genetics Meeting in Chicago. You’ll hear more about the main part of the meeting later, or you can check out the Storify of the tweets from the conference. In this post I wanted to specifically highlight one of the lunch sessions.

The GSA had invited Jennifer Zeitzer, Director of Legislative Relations at FASEB, to talk about science advocacy over lunch. There were about a dozen scientists in the room, but what she talked about is interesting to quite a number of people, so I’ll try to recap some of the main points she made.

The talk was aimed at American researchers, but much of the message is applicable to other countries: Politicians know very little about science, they never meet scientists, and there is always a limited amount of money to be distributed. If you want these things to change, you can, and should, step up. Here are a few of the points Jennifer discussed in her talk:

Be vocal
One of the main points Jennifer made, was that scientists need to be more vocal. Small organizations that make a lot of noise always get a lot of attention (she gave the Tea Party as example) but scientists barely make themselves seen or heard to politicians. She emphasized the importance of individuals fighting for science policies and science funding. Even though there are various professional organizations fighting on researchers’ behalves, it makes a much bigger impression if scientists themselves come up and speak to politicians.

Have a clear message
Your message should be clear and very specific. Ask for specific amounts, or for support for specific projects. Be realistic in terms of what you can expect, and be prepared to address suggested trade-offs.

Contact politicians and build relationships
In countries like the US and UK (and others with similar voting systems) you will have a local elected official or member of parliament whom you can email or make an appointment with. They are representing you and the other people living in your area, and they really want to hear from you.

If you email, make sure to only include one issue per message, and be very clear. Several politicians are also on Twitter. Some have aides that handle those media for them, while others do it themselves.

Because so few politicians know any scientists personally, they will be happy to meet you, and may even want to pick your brain in the future. Even PhD students and postdocs, who may feel they’re not senior enough, are incredibly useful contacts for politicians to have. To them, you ARE a scientist. You’re using the funding and the facilities and doing the work! And if they ask you something you don’t know, you can always tell them that you will ask someone or look it up.

If you don’t know any politicians personally, keep an eye out for possible connections, via alumni organization, for example.

Generate public awareness
Another way to be involved in science advocacy is simply by doing anything that increases the public awareness of the impact of research in your community. You can give talks at schools or community groups, invite elected officials to visit your lab, or write a letter to the local paper.

The FASEB office of public affairs (where Jennifer works) is on Twitter as @FASEBopa and their website also has a handy list of advocacy resources for scientists.

To add to these notes of the advocacy lunch, I wanted to share a real-world case of science advocacy that involved many of the examples in this talk. In 2010, a group of scientists in the UK managed to stop a proposed cut in science funding. The Science is Vital campaign was started by individuals (not an organization), made extensive use of contacts to reach politicians and the public, involved scientists rallying at parliament and people meeting politicians for conversations, and had a very clear and specific message. Find out more on their site.
(Their follow-up campaign, on science careers, was covered on the Node.)

(4 votes)

Loading...