In a little over a week, ten of my University of Michigan Masters of Public Health students will embark on an intensive science blogging course – and they need your help!
Every week for ten weeks, each student will take a recent scientific publication or emerging area of scientific interest, and write a public blog post on it that is aimed at a non expert and non technical audience. And as they do this, they will be evaluated in the most brutal way possible – by the audience they are writing for!
The blog is Mind The Science Gap (mindthesciencegap.org, or mtsg.org for short), and the course is designed to use the medium of science blogging to develop more generally applicable communication skills.
This is where you come in: We are looking for people who are willing to read and comment on the posts each week, and help the participants hone their skills. You don’t have to be an expert in what is being written about – you just have to have an opinion over whether the pieces connect with you or not, and how they could be improved. Even comments as short of “I liked this” or “I don’t get this” are tremendously helpful in indicating what works, and what does not.
Whether you are a public health expert, a science communicator, or simply someone who enjoys reading about science and health, please consider checking into the blog regularly and commenting on what you read. If you can commit to leaving a couple of comments a week, please consider becoming a mentor – check out the blog’s Mentor page for details. Even if you can’t, please do read the posts and comment when you get the chance.
And please do spread the word – the more readers and the more comments, the quicker these ten students will develop the skills necessary to communicate complex science to a broad audience.
Blogging starts on January 16th – Thank you for your support, and see you there!