Community Science: Advancing Community Priorities Together
ASTC’s Community Science Initiative connects and supports its members and others in engaging in and advancing community science—an emerging practice that nurtures relationships between science and communities to address community priorities.
From engaging community members in land use decisions to strengthening relationships between residents and local media, community science in its many forms works at the nexus of science and society to meet community challenges while allowing science engagement centers to further fulfill their missions.
Watch the video below to learn more about the goals and impacts of community science!
Resources to Support Practice & Partnerships
In alignment with ASTC’s Strategic Framework this online hub houses a diverse set of frameworks, resources, tools, and opportunities to support community science within science and technology centers and museums via five central approaches—dialogue and deliberation, community-driven citizen science, civic engagement and policy making, open innovation, and participatory research. For example:
- Check out our resource library for examples and experimental models of community science that can be funded, evaluated, and replicated.
- In the Dialogue & Deliberation toolkit, find key skills and methods for engaging community members in discussions that surface or refine community priorities and support decision-making around complex challenges.
- Our Civic Engagement & Policymaking toolkit serves as a guide for organizations to thoughtfully identify and implement ways to nurture civic experiences across their work or deepen ongoing civic initiatives for meaningful community change.
- Numerous virtual engagement opportunities allow for learning, connection, and sharing of community science questions, challenges, expertise, and resources.
Get started by visiting communityscience.astc.org and signing up below for our e-mail list to stay up to date on virtual workshops and webinars, funding opportunities, and more!
Our Funders & Partners
This initiative is made possible with the leadership of the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation and the past support of the Chan-Zuckerberg Initiative and Public Interest Technology University Network. We are grateful for their collective support and vision for ASTC’s community science initiative.
We also deeply value the contribution of our partners, including the American Geophysical Union (AGU)’s Thriving Earth Exchange, National Coalition of Dialogue & Deliberation, and Expert & Citizen Assessment of Science & Technology Network (ECAST).
Contact
If you have any questions, feedback, or would like to support ASTC’s Community Science Initiative, please send us an email.