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A Paradigm Shift: How universities can support effective outreach

This post is written by Chris Buddle, Associate Professor at McGill University. Click here for contact information, or follow on twitter.

    On Wednesday,  COMPASS published a commentary in PLOS Biology on the journey from science outreach to meaningful engagement. This post is part of a series of reactions, reflections, and personal experiences we hope will expand the conversation. Read the summary post here, or track the conversation by searching for #reachingoutsci

I really enjoyed the article by Smith et al. – it presents a clear rationale for why effective science communication is so important, and it discusses some of the key issues, including the need for the right kind of training and right kind of institutional support.  This quote from the article really struck me, and I think it gets to the heart of the issue:

“Academic institutions and tenure committees must measure and reward time and effort devoted to outreach. And that, we’re keenly aware, will require dedicated leadership and collective effort to change the culture of science”

Good, but how?  Without answering the ‘how’ we will struggle to get further ahead.  I realize that individuals must lead the charge in doing and valuing outreach activities, but in addition to this bottom-up movement, there must be top-down support, training and direction from Universities. This is especially relevant for the Academics who may be keen to do outreach, but whose institutions don’t support this endeavor in a direct manner. So, to achieve a broad, more global acceptance of outreach activities, Academic institutions have some important things to do, and in this post I will explore these.

I will also expand the discussion beyond ‘scientific communication’ to ‘outreach‘ more broadly defined. Outreach is a term that includes the type of effective communication discussed by Smith et al., but also includes other outreach activities that I see among my colleagues -  it could be sharing knowledge with local elementary schools, writing blogs or articles in the local newspaper, to organizing nature walks and delivering public lectures.

Outreach just doesn’t fit easily into the typical and traditional parts of an Academic’s job. Academics are incentive-driven, and the currency of Academia remains the peer-reviewed publications, effective teaching and some form of service. The latter category is a catch-all for various committees, involvement with scholarly societies, editorial work, and anything else that doesn’t fit into teaching and research. What about outreach? Is it service?  Outreach is certainly at the intersection of research and service, but can also be part of teaching (e.g., social media as a way to take the classroom beyond the walls of the institution…).  A while ago I tracked my own work hours, I didn’t include writing my blog as part of the hours – I just wasn’t sure how to categorize outreach activities, nor did I feel that my institution would necessarily see outreach as a core duty. And that is the crux of the problem.

How can Academic institutions incentivize and value outreach activities?

1) Academics who do high quality outreach activities should get paid more. Promotion and salary increases should be tied to the level, but more importantly, the quality of outreach activities done by Academics.  Those who do not engage with a broader audience about their work would not be eligible for full pay raises. Extreme?  Perhaps so… but I suspect it would work.  This does not mean the quality of the research will decrease, nor does this imply any kind of shot-gun approach to outreach will work.  In fact, a measured and careful strategy with outreach is required, as Simon Donner argues in his excellent post.  And, of course, the research upon which the outreach is built must be strong and high quality – we cannot give up research excellence for outreach – they must go hand in hand. If outreach is tied to pay raises, this raises the question of evaluating these kinds of activities. How do you measure amount and quality of outreach?  This is incredibly difficult (“hey, I got 500 hits on my blog – I guess I’ll get promotion to full professor now!”). A reasonable Chair or Dean may be able to judge effective outreach, and the onus would certainly be on the Academics to make their case about their outreach activities; after all, we do this already, all the time. We need to justify journal choice, our level of funding, why we may or may not have a certain number of graduate students, etc. Adding commentary about how much outreach we do could be included in the mix.  There could be a system by which an Academic is only considered for a certain level of a raise if s/he can provide evidence of high quality outreach activities. Judging this quality will be difficult, and will certainly require some deep conversations about what kinds of outreach activities are valuable, and why.

2) Institutions need to make effective outreach activities a part of their institutional culture. Home Depot, for example, includes ‘giving back to the community‘ as one of its core value, and people working at Home Depot go out, as a community, to help build homes for people in need.  Almost all Universities have mission statements that include words about ‘service to communities’ (not convinced? Check out a few – here’s the one for McGill) but by in large, Academics don’t do this on a regular basis, and in most cases it’s certainly not a requirement of the job! Institutions must work to build outreach directly into their culture and this must include active and direct participation by Academics – the people who are doing the research need to be in the community giving mini-workshops, talking to the general public, writing articles for the local press, and writing blogs that explain their work in a manner that is accessible to a broad audience. Universities can help facilitate this with effective marketing about outreach activities, highlight the ways their researchers are engaging with the public, and making it clear how Academic staff are really working with the mission statement in mind. I do recognize that some of this is already done, but I am arguing that it could be done more broadly and better integrated into all facets of the institution. As mentioned above, this could be a reality if pay raises were linked to outreach activities…

3) Coordination:  Academics cannot do outreach in isolation. The article by Smith et al. does point to the incredible value of COMPASS and how that framework can bring people together, and can be a true collaboration in all the rights ways. However, this also has to happen at a more local level, and I find that outreach activities tend to be done in a haphazard manner at Universities.  There is often a lack of co-ordination between media offices from different parts of the University, among researchers, and between researchers and media offices.  Most Academics don’t do any outreach. Of those that do, a few might be in regular communication with a media office, but many ‘go it alone’ and independently engage some outside organization, journalist, or write their own blog and publicize work without support or without much attention to the subtleties or nuances of the process. This is certainly what I do, and although it’s been fun, validating and a positive experience, I don’t have the training, nor do I really know if what I’m doing is correct ! Media office, despite their best intentions, may not always get the story right and/or may not get the required materials from the researchers.  Despite a willingness and interest for effective outreach from different arms of institutions, a lack of coordination means work is being duplicated, and stories are missed. A solution? Media relations offices at Universities should spend as much time with ‘internal’ media and communication as with ‘external communication’ with journalists or other news media. There must be an easy and clear process by which Academics can communicate laterally within their institutions. Media offices must effectively aggregate the various blogs, research findings, big grant winners and Academics must have a willingness to engage with these media offices, provide them content and access. One way to make this process much, much easier is through the use of plain language summaries.

4) Write and speak in plain language. Institutions, publishers, and peers need to demand plain language summaries for all research papers. We are used to writing abstracts; we also need to write plain language summaries. I’ve written about this before, and I am trying to write plain language summaries of my papers (e.g., see here and here for examples).  This has been a very interesting process, and what has been especially useful about these summaries is that they have provide me an easy way to talk to my media office, students, my family, and peers about my work. These summaries have forced me to think about the broader meaning and impact of my research.  It’s forced me to think beyond ‘I’m doing this research because little is known on the topic‘ and clarify the meaning behind the work – the broader framework. I think this is the start of effective outreach. I have worked with a few other authors on plain language summaries, and what has become clear is that these are not easy to write, and require a different set of writing skills.  Training is required to help Academics write in plain language.

5) Institutions must require communication workshops for all Academics. When I first started my job, I attended a lot of workshops, and the topics included things like ‘how to prepare a course outline’, ‘research ethics’, ‘the tenure process’, etc.  Communication courses must be part of this mix, and a requirement of the job should be training in communication and outreach. As Smith et al. point out, we lack training – some of us can write in a jargon-free way, and are happy to put together a talk for a local naturalist club, and are willing to speak to journalists: many of us don’t know how to do this, don’t know where to start, are afraid to take the leap, or have done things badly and are perhaps nervous about outreach activities. We’ve been trained to write research papers; we’ve not been trained to write in other ways, or in language that is more accessible to a broader audience.  We’ve been trained to give specialized talks at conferences, or to speak to undergraduate students in a familiar lecture hall.  Many of us don’t know how to put together a presentation to a room full of school kids. We need help, and our institutions need to provide quality training opportunities, and ensure Academics take advantage of the opportunities.

A key issue, and one that is pointed out by Smith et al., is that Academics don’t have the time to do outreach activities. We are pushed and pulled in various directions, and it’s hard to juggle the regular and required part of our jobs, so how can anyone rightfully argue that we must also include communication of our research to a broader audience? Jessica Hellmann talks about this in her lovely post about science communication and outreach. There’s no denying that it’s a chronic problem, and there’s no easy solution. However, finding ways to dovetail the research with outreach can lead to efficiencies, new collaborations, and new ways of doing things. Smith et al. do discuss the value-added that can come from outreach.

The chronic time issue is exactly why outreach MUST be incentivized, and why institutional cultures must shift to require, accept, and reward effective outreach activities. This will have to happen from the top-down and the bottom-up. University Principals need to make it clear that their institutions are truly at the service of the larger community in which they reside and live. From a bottom-up perspective, individual Academics need to buy into the idea of effective outreach, and may need a nudge here and there to make it happen, and be fully supported in these endeavours.  But it can happen! Universities can change, over time, and they have the skills and the people to make it work.

It is also very timely to be thinking seriously about how Academic institutions re-think outreach activities - the place of Universities in today’s society is being questioned, and effective outreach is one way to help ensure that everyone sees what we do, and why. How our work relates to policy, government priorities, our environment; how we are working to understand climate change, fight against persecution of the poorest members of our society and how are working to understand global health issues. The list goes one. Donors will be more willing to give money if they really had a clear handle on what Academics do and why. Media offices could do a better job of promoting our Universities if they had access to a all Academics who are engaged with outreach Activities.

To finish: Smith et al.’s paper was optimistic, exciting, and a truly great contribution to the discussion about science communication.  What I worry about is that we must move beyond this article to some clear ways that institutions can properly incentivize and support outreach articles. I hope these ideas (and others) are discussed, debated and that institutions can move towards a new paradigm that includes effective outreach.

If we can figure this out, we’ll all win. 

A special thanks to Elena Bennett for reading over and helping me with an earlier draft of this post.

Reference:

Smith B, Baron N, English C, Galindo H, Goldman E, et al. (2013) COMPASS: Navigating the Rules of Scientific Engagement. PLoS Biol 11(4): e1001552. doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1001552

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Expiscor (29 April 2013)

As you may have noticed, the ‘weekly’ Expiscor missed last week! This is because I have opted to change to Mondays for this blog feature.  The start of the week just works better, for a whole suite of reasons that I won’t bore you with!  So, you can now look forward to starting your week with some odd discoveries, from arthropods to general biology and other geekery.

  • Most (many?) Arachnologists know of Emerton’s classic “The Common Spiders of the United States” written in 1902 – that book is now available on-line! Big WIN for spider enthusiasts.
  • Be still my heart.  Here’s a video showing the heartbeat of a spider after being captured and placed in a mud-dauber (wasp) nest.  Wasp finds spider. Paralyzes it. Returns it to its nest. Spider is still alive. A tasty feast for later on…. (thanks to Spider Joe for this video!)
  • Adrian Thysse always impresses me with his amazing photographs.  This one depicts one of the most lovely spiders in North America, Habronattus americanus.  Yes, it’s one of my most favourite spiders, here’s why:
Habronattus americanus - photography by A. Thysse (reproduced here, with permission)

Habronattus americanus - photography by A. Thysse (reproduced here, with permission)

  • If you don’t buy stuff on ETSY, you should – amazing on-line resource. Also, some lovely insects finds on ETSY, including this from GollyBard (thanks Cameron Webb for pointing me to this)
One of GollyBard's paintings - listing here. (reproduced here with permission)

One of GollyBard’s paintings – listing here. (reproduced here with permission)

  • Peeping peepers: I live on the outskirts of Montreal and over the past week, the spring peepers have been making some noise! (spring –> it’s here!)
  • Milk Cartons & Guitars: Two musical bits to wrap up.  First, I’m especially fond of bluegrass, old-time, trad., folk, indie…. My colleague and friend Elena Bennett pointed me to the “Milk Carton Kids” – what a talented duo.
  • And, to finish… talk about GEEKY!  Here’s the “Arthropod song“

“Baby you’re and arthropod. Shake that segmented bod”

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Kids Like Bugs: entomology outreach in elementary schools (Part 2)

     On Wednesday, Chris Buddle and Paul Manning posted the first of a two-part series on outreach activities in elementary schools. That post focused on the ‘why’ - this one (also written by Chris and Paul) is about the ‘how’.

How to talk to kids about bugs:

First thing about talking to elementary school kids is stay calm and don’t worry!  If you have any University-level training in Entomology, you are qualified – Now, this doesn’t mean you have to be able to speak about all aspects of entomology: play to your strengths! If you are a taxonomists working on Syrphidae flies, bring in your flies and talk about them these magnificent animals.  If your experience is broader and less specialized, browse some notes, look on-line, or peek at a textbook: do a short overview of the main Orders of insects and their characteristics. Although most kids get some entomology in elementary schools, it’s not usually very much (although ALL kids do seem to learn about monarch butterflies!).

One great way to speak to kids about bugs is to make the session thematic.  In addition to bringing in a drawer or two of insects, link the specimens to biology. For example, one of us (Paul) has recently used ‘metamorphosis’ as a focal point for discussion. The transition from larvae to adult is a biological wonder, and acts as an excellent focal point for discussion. It brings together different facets of biology, from hormones, to physiological development, behavioural adaptations, through to discussion about life history strategies.  Paul brought galls into the classroom, and demonstrated that there were larvae living inside. The students screamed with excitement when they saw the larvae living within the gall. One student described it as a ‘cute white blob‘. Several students asked if they could bring the larvae home (wouldn’t Mom and Dad just LOVE that!).

Kids like bugs. And they like to draw them.

Kids like bugs. And they like to draw them.

Don’t be afraid to say “I don’t know”.  In fact, kids find it refreshing to hear that an ‘expert’ doesn’t know all the answers.  Turn it around to illustrate that the world of entomology is so vast that there are a lot of unknowns out there, and many questions still to be answered.

Have patience. With younger grades, asking kids questions, or having them answer questions, can quickly turn into ‘stories’ from young, enthusiastic students. For example:

Q: Does anyone know what kind of insect a ladybug is?

        [Hand shoots into the air...]

 A (from a 6 year old): Um, yes, I know a lot about those things.  Once, when I was 4, I remember that I saw a beautiful bug flying by my garden – it was really big and black and I think it was a ladybug and my granddad told me about how ones like that eat trees and kill the trees and that makes me sad because we have a big tree in our front yard that I really like but sometimes my little bratty brother hides behind it and scares me when I am walking by. But I really like all bugs especially ladybug ones that are red but they smell funny sometimes and my mom said they can bite – will they bite me if I play with them? why do they smell funny? why are there so many spots on them? do their spots get bigger when they grow….

Give kids a chance to tell you these stories, but know that it will take patience…. but heck, if bugs get them talking and excited, that can’t be a bad thing!

(as an aside, most elementary school teachers will typically coach students so that they will ask/answer question instead of tell stories)

Bring a few props: If you can do an event outdoors, try to bring a few sweep nets and vials.  We will often bring extra vials from the lab and give students the vials to keep (heck, plastic vials cost very little!). For MONTHS afterwards, parents will often tell us about how their child packed that vial full of insects and carried it around obsessively for weeks. That’s a great way to inspire entomology.

Beetle galleries are easily found in wood, and can be a great prop to bring to an entomology session with school kids.

If you are doing an indoor talk, make sure to have a lot of photographs of interesting insects, and whenever possible, discuss/show or use examples from your local fauna – this will allow kids to connect to things they have seen on the playground or in their own yards – this connection between the content you are discussing and the insects they are seeing on their own, is very powerful.  With a smaller group, you can certainly bring in a few drawers of insects – if you don’t have any, this becomes a great excuse to make a little synoptic collection of your own to use for educational purposes. Or, ask your local entomology museum, or local naturalist club, about borrowing some specimens.

Whenever possible, bring a few ‘real’ field guides. One of us (CB) ran a biodiversity challenge at an elementary school and managed to convince the school to buy a couple of sets of field guides. The kids LOVE the look and feel of real field guides and will thumb through them with delight. Part of our own passion about natural history can be traced back to field guides in our houses when we were young.

A field guide to insects - suitable for all ages!

A field guide to insects – suitable for all ages!

Don’t dumb down the material: Too often we think kids need to be talked down to, but nothing is further from the truth. As mentioned above, kids are sponges for information and in our experience they want to hear the details. You will want to avoid jargon, but other than that, provide the details whenever you can. Again, doing a ‘thematic’ talk with school kids becomes quite important because you just won’t have time to cover anything in-depth if you try to cover too much.

Finally, and most importantly, be passionate and enthusiastic. Kids will feel your positive energy and love of entomology; they will feed off of this, take it home with them; they will start asking more questions, start to dream, and fall further in love with the world around them. Spending a bit of time in a classroom is perhaps one of the most important kinds of outreach activities to do.

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Kids Like Bugs: entomology outreach in elementary schools (Part 1)

         Written by Chris Buddle and Paul Manning.

Spending time talking to kids about Entomology is ALWAYS worth it. If ever invited to speak at an elementary school about insects, always say “yes”, and in this post, we’ll expand on why it’s worth your time. In a second post on this topic, we’ll provide some tips on how to talk to kids about bugs.  Although these posts are focused primarily at elementary school events, the ideas and tips could be expanded to community nature walks, events at an ‘earth day’ celebration, hosting a bug day in your backyard, etc.

Part 1: Why talk to kids about bugs?

Most kids aren’t afraid of nature. In our experience, elementary school kids (especially the younger grades) still have a fascination with entomology and are still curious and excited by ‘bugs’. Later in life, it seems that many kids will follow one of several paths: (a) disinterest, (b) disgust, or (c) delight. As entomologists, in a field that is so important, getting kids to be delighted is very important.

Kids like bugs.

Kids like bugs.

Kids already know a lot but they like an expert to verify their findings and support their interests. In our experience, kids can get especially excited about insects because they see them all the time – they have played with them in their yards, tasted them (perhaps), and probably spend time trying to burn them with a magnifying glass. Bugs are accessible, small, curious, and catchable, and thus kids learn about them – an entomologist can keep facilitating this learning.

Kids are truly amazed that you can ‘get a job‘ studying insects. This is unfathomable to them, since they don’t typically get much exposure to biologists. They are exposed to limited career options (“I want to play in the NHL“, “I want to be a doctor“, “I want to be a firefighter“) in part because our school systems often exclude the cool jobs like “stream ecologist”, “geologist”, or “entomologist”. The idea that you can spend time (as an adult!) collecting and curating insects (i.e., FUN STUFF) can be quite extraordinary. In our experiences, it’s so painfully obvious that working outdoors with insects is simply not noticed as a real job by many people; entomologists must work to correct this. Giving kids exposure to wonderful careers (like entomology) can help encourage future scientists that there are truly enjoyable careers that involve getting ones hands dirty, and spending time outside.

Entomologists have a responsibility to dispel myths about arthropods, and this should start at an early age. Invariably, we get statements from kids such as “My Dad told me to stay away from spiders ’cause they will bite you“, or “My aunt told me that earwigs go into your ear, so I hate them“, or “I am allergic to bees because my cousin is allergic“, etc. We can bring clarity to these kinds of statements, and by offering an ‘expert opinion’ on these topics, can help kids understand the real facts about entomology.

Kids are sponges: it is satisfying to speak to an audience who is fully engaged and willing to soak up as much as you can provide. Bugs are a very exciting topic for kids, and they will remain interested, excited and enthused if you continue to provide good content.

EPSON MFP image

Kids ask great questions.  As an example, one of us (PM) recently talked about insects to an elementary school class. The class was asked to guess what was living within a gall, and to make guesses as to what they thought the gall was, and how it was formed. After one student quickly suggested that an insect was living within the gall, a flurry of wonderful questions began. Students asked questions like:

  • How did the insect get inside the gall?
  • How does the insect survive the winter?
  • What does the insect eat when inside the plant?
  • Why doesn’t the insect kill the plant?

All of these questions prompt interesting, and relevant discussions that fit well within learning objectives in science curriculum. Providing a concrete example that is applicable to students, might also result in a better understanding of the concept.

Finally, it’s nice to talk to kids about bugs because they genuinely appreciate it. Being thanked for spending time doing this kind of outreach is really, really nice. And, sometimes you might receive some nice thank-you cards or posters to put up on your wall.  To us, these are as important as a diploma on your wall, or a favourite butterfly poster. Thank-you notes from kids are some of the most wonderful things to read, and they often include delightful, creative, and colourful drawings.

EPSON MFP image

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Expiscor (19 April 2013)

Here’s  Expiscor -some discoveries I stumbled upon this week… (past versions can be found here)

  • World’s Biggest Butterfly Collection.  This video explores the amazing collection at London’s Natural History Museum.
  • Spiders, spiders, lovely spiders.  How about this image of a spitting spider by Chris Ruijter – STUNNING (thanks Alex Wild for directing me to Chris’ photos…)
A spitting spider, photo by Chris Ruijter (reproduced here, with permission)

A spitting spider, photo by Chris Ruijter (reproduced here, with permission)

  • The trees are speaking… this story describes how scientists listen to ultrasonic noise made by bubbles forming inside water-stressed trees (thanks Carly Ziter for that link)
  • More on the links between Art and Science.  The debate about “E.O. Wilson versus Math” inspired a discussion in my ecology class, but coincidentally, a friend of mine also pointed me to this truly lovely writing about Mathematics and the Arts (starts on page 55), written by Marston Morse in1959. Here is a quote from that piece:

            “…mathematics is the sister as well as the servant of the arts and is touched by the same madness and genius. This must be known.”

  • A passion for beetles: a retired researcher from Germany’s Federal Center for Meat Research in Bavaria has a lovely collection of Coleoptera, 6,000 species at over 30,000 individuals. Now that’s a hobby! (thanks Bug Girl for the tweet about that story)
  • To finish, glad to see that Entomologists are out there correcting bad taxonomy.  Here, Ainsley Seago (aka @AmericanBeetles) does some fine work (and it was given a stamp of approval by Taxonomy Hulk – yes, we do need him, too!)

Screen Shot 2013-04-18 at 8.21.19 AM

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Ecology and Mathematics: perspectives from undergraduate students

Post written by Chris Buddle and Carly Ziter (MSc student at McGill – you can follow her on twitter)

Population and Community Ecology is an introductory undergraduate course at McGill University and each lecture typically starts with an x-axis and a y-axis drawn on the chalkboard – something like this:

Chalk board, with x- and y-axis. The start of every lecture.

Chalk board, with x- and y-axis. The start of every lecture.

The course is taught from a quantitative perspective, and it uses equations, models and graphs to cover concepts ranging from logistic population growth, to metapopulation ecology and estimating species diversity.  The class uses Gotelli’s “A Primer of Ecology” as the text – a book that walks through many ecological concepts from first principles. It includes calculus, probability theory, statistical distributions, and null models.

It was therefore fitting that the ‘E.O. Wilson versus Math” debate was discussed during lecture last week.  Students were asked to read Wilson’s piece in the Wall Street Journal, and read some of the blog posts that reacted to this, including Jeremy Fox and Brian McGill‘s posts on dynamic ecology. Students were also asked to look at some of Terry McGlynn’s writing over at small pond science, and to come to lecture prepared – to have opinions and be willing to discuss these opinions.

For those not fully aware of this debate, here it is in a nutshell: Wilson argued that a ‘deep’ understanding of math may not always be prerequisite for doing great science, or at least may not be required for generating big ideas and concepts. Wilson was in part trying to encourage people who are ‘math phobic’ that this phobia needs not be a reason to stay out of science.  Not surprisingly, this stirred up a lot of debate (and some of it was rather harsh!), and the debate was particularly interesting from the perspective of Ecology since this discipline has always struggled with this topic (see Terry’s excellent post about tribalism in ecology for some perspectives on this).

Here is a summary of the key points that were discussed during lecture – and let’s just say that a 50 minute lecture slot was NOT enough time for this topic! (by the way, there were between 50 and 60 students who attended this  lecture, and the class is comprised primarily of students studying environmental biology).

Many of the students were surprised at the tone and overall discussion points that emerged from Jeremy Fox’s post – they argued that when they read Wilson’s piece, they didn’t feel the intended audience was ‘established’ ecologists – but rather the post was meant for students at the start of their careers. Some of them found the blog posts way over the top, and the academic discussions took away from the main message.  Some felt that Wilson was arguing in part about the need for freedom to think without any boundaries (mathematics, or anything else).  Creative thought need not be constrained, and students coming up through the system, whether they are math literate or not, should never fear heading into science (indeed, some confessed that an increase in math courses may have driven them away from biology altogether).  Related to this, mathematical models all require assumptions (we talked a LOT about this when working through Gotelli’s book!), and any assumptions are limiting and could distract from thinking out of the box about any topics, including ones that are ecological. These students worried that the constraints imposed by math could force ecologists to view the world through a particular lens.

That being said, many of the students also agreed that a deeper understanding of mathematics was absolutely required for ecology – especially since the world is complex, with complex problems – problems that require multiple disciplines to solve.  However, while these disciplines include mathematics and biology, they also include literature, history, environmental policy, and more.  What a solid argument! And it was great to see that argument expressed by 20 year-olds.  Yes, math is important, but it is one tool that we need in this world, and it’s not necessarily more important than other tools.  While some ecologists are strong in math, others may prefer to hone their policy skills, for example. Ecology’s strength, in part, is in its ability to bridge different disciplines and students expressed how ecology is actually a ‘great uniter’ of biology and math (and other fields, certainly some areas of ecology draw upon a range of ideas from sustainability science, medicine, economics, history, etc).

The students also expressed concern about how mathematics is taught, from elementary school all the way to University – they expressed how learning mathematics in isolation of other topics is ‘ok’ for individuals with an intuition and natural ability with math – but many students felt that a better way to learn about math was applying it to the ‘real world’. The application of mathematics is the best route to learn mathematics. Ecology was again touted as a perfect example of a discipline in which application of mathematics is clear – from predicting distribution of invasive species to modelling species richness in fragmented forests.  For some students, math was not a subject they initially enjoyed, or strove to learn – it was ultimately through their study of ecology that they began to value math as a tool they could use to support their discoveries, and lend credibility to their work.

By in large, students agreed that mathematics was required for ecology, but there was certainly debate about how much was enough – whether it was enough to use mathematics as a tool, or that perhaps mathematics was more like a language.  A language in which fluency is required so all the nuances can be understood and that the full meaning is in place.  From those advocating mathematical “fluency”, there was a strong opinion that like languages, mathematics can be learned with hard work and focus (yes, they agree with Wilson on this point!) – this opinion comes with a wealth of experience in the classroom at McGill since many of the students are mother-tongue French and have learned English after coming to McGill.  In other words, if you can learn a language you can also learn math.

The final argument put forward by students was that this entire discussion about Ecology was from a very narrow perspective – what about the role of traditional ecological knowledge?  Ecology is a much older discipline than Clements, von Humbolt, Haeckel, or even Aristotle. Throughout history, humans have been interacting with their environment, and have been observing nature.  By this act, humans have been counting, developing models, and making predictions… for thousands of years.  Linking mathematics to nature is very, very old.  Ecologists ought to pay more attention to other ways of looking at the natural world, other ways to visualize, predict, observe and count. Although this is certainly not the same kind of math as presented by Gotelli, perhaps it could be as insightful.

Screen Shot 2013-04-15 at 3.27.33 PM

In sum, the discussion with undergraduate students on this topic was insightful, fascinating and important. There was clearly a strong appreciation for the role of mathematics in ecology, but also different ideas about the degree to which a deep understanding of math is required – which often related back to the students own struggles with, or aptitude for, math earlier in their studies. It was validating to hear that they appreciated using Gotelli’s book to learn the foundations of ecology, and recognized that ecological models can be both limiting and liberating.

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Expiscor (12 April 2013)

I am pleased to bring you the third edition of Expiscor – a weekly digest of discoveries and curiosities, from Arachnids, to natural history and beyond.  You can view previous postings here and here.

  • I’ve been editing work from two of my Master’s students who will soon be graduating – both on Arctic spiders – here are a couple of great quotes from their work, about spiders: “There are a recognized 43,244 species and sub-species of spider worldwide,  46% of which are described based on only one sex” and “18% of total linyphiid species in the world found north of 60°”  WOW – clearly much work is needed in Arachnology, and we ought to work in the North for some families.
A Solifugid - this stunning image is courtesy of Joe Lapp ("spider joe"), reproduced here with permission.

A Solifugid – this stunning image is courtesy of Joe Lapp (“spider joe”), reproduced here with permission.

  • Climate Change: it’s real.  It’s pervasive.  Not convinced?  Have a look at this – it’ll take you 26 seconds.
  • On a lighter note, do you like BRAINS?  Visit the Brain Museum….
  • And to finish, watch this if you need a laugh.  (Not for everybody, but this goofy, physical comedy with some biological realism made me chuckle out loud …and thanks CayBeach for tweeting about it)