Let's Talk SciComm Unimelb SciComm

This week we had a fabulous conversation with multi-award winning science journalist Dr Jackson Ryan. Jackson is a former molecular biologist and current freelance science journalist with a focus on longform and narrative non-fiction science writing. He served as the Science Editor at CNET.com between 2018 and 2023 and was the 2022 winner of the Eureka Prize for Science Journalism. In 2024, he is co-editing the Best Australian Science Writing anthology -- and you should buy it! His longform writing has appeared in The Guardian, The Saturday Paper, The Monthly and Nature. 

You can follow Jackson and learn more about his work here:

https://www.jacksonwryan.com

https://www.linkedin.com/in/jacksonryanscience

https://x.com/dctrjack

https://sjaa.org.au (Jackson is President of the Science Journalists Association of Australia)

https://www.linkedin.com/company/science-journalists-association-of-australia

You can read Jackson’s Antarctica stories here: https://linktr.ee/dctrj 

This week we were privileged to have a wonderful conversation with Dr Rachel Nowak who is a consultant, an advisor, a scientist and a journalist. She has been working in science, technology and innovation on three continents.

Her specialities include science journalism, knowledge mobilisation, research and technology assessment, and stakeholder engagement.

She has been Washington Bureau Chief and Australasian Editor of New Scientist magazine. She was Director of Research Marketing and Communications at the University of Melbourne. She founded the social-good brain tech start-up The Brain Dialogue and is currently a Consultant Editor with Custom Media at the Nature Springer group. 

Rachel did her PhD in agricultural science at the University of Leeds. She studied writing, alongside poets and novelists, at The Johns Hopkins University.

Her award-winning science journalism has changed R&D and medical practice, and research law and policy around the world.

Rachel immigrated to Australia on a Distinguished Talent visa for her international record of outstanding achievements in science communication.

You can follow Rachel and learn more about her work here:

https://www.nowakassociates.net/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-rachel-nowak-gaicd/

https://twitter.com/DrRachelNowak

Transcript: https://go.unimelb.edu.au/6nb8

We’re so thrilled to be back with you for Season 11 of Let’s Talk SciComm. And to get the season off to a brilliant start, we had a wonderful conversation with Sara Phillips.

Sara is an award-winning science writer and editor based in Melbourne, Australia. She edited the 2020, 10th-anniversary edition of the Best Australian Science Writing.

Previously, she was Asia-Pacific bureau chief for Nature News, executive editor for the Asia-Pacific region of Nature Research Group’s custom publishing arm, the national environment reporter for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, and editor of ABC Environment online, a now-archived portal for the ABC’s environment content.

Starting out on an environmental trade publication WME, she later became deputy editor of Cosmos magazine, where she was part of the team that won magazine of year not once, but twice. Cosmos Online won internet site of the year under her editorship. And the editor won editor of the year for 2005 and 2006, while she was supporting him.

She was also the founding editor of G magazine, a sustainable lifestyle magazine. Her team won consumer magazine of the year (for print run over 30,000) at the Bell Awards for magazine publishing, and she took out editor of the year.

You can follow Sara and find out more about her work here:

https://saraphillips.net.au/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/sara-phillips-3a15635/ 

https://www.abc.net.au/news/sara-phillips/3549260

https://invasives.org.au/our-team/sara-phillips/

Transcript: https://go.unimelb.edu.au/syy8

We’re ending Season 10 on a high, chatting with Brendon Bosworth in Cape Town, South Africa. Brendan is a communications specialist and science communication trainer who runs Human Element Communications. Brendon’s goal is to make research on topics of global concern, such as climate change and sustainable development, more accessible to non-specialists.

After working as a communications officer on a large international climate change adaptation project in 2018, and as a journalist for more than 10 years before that, Brendon decided he wanted to work with scientists to build their communication skills. He partnered with Dr Tali Hoffman (director of Honeyguide Science Communication) to develop a science communication training programme, ‘Communicating Science for Impact.’

Since launching the programme in 2020, he and Dr Hoffman have trained over 300 people from institutions including UNEP, FAO, the University of Cape Town, the University of Ghana, the University of Nairobi, and the University of Saskatchewan to communicate about science with non-specialists more effectively. 

Brendon is a Fulbright scholar with a master’s degree in Journalism from the University of Colorado Boulder. In his previous life as a journalist, he wrote about everything from ocean acidification to mental health, with some surf travel writing in between.

He is also a photographer whose work has been featured in exhibitions in South Africa and abroad.

As a consultant, Brendon has provided writing, editing, and communication services to clients including UN-Habitat, CARE, the Global Center on Adaptation, and the World Urban Forum.

You can follow Brendon and learn more about his work here:

https://www.humanelementcommunications.com/

https://www.humanelementcommunications.com/insights

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=am1-e0G27X8&t=974s (A recent interview Brendon did with Fancy Comma)

https://www.brendonbosworth.com/ (Brendon’s photography website)

https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendonbosworth

https://www.instagram.com/brendon_bos/

https://twitter.com/BrendonBosworth

Transcript: https://go.unimelb.edu.au/eyy8

This week we have the immense pleasure of speaking with the brilliant Alicia Sometimes. Alicia is a multi-award winning poet and broadcaster who is deeply passionate about both art and science. She has performed her poetry at many venues, festivals and events around the world. Alicia is director/co-writer of the art/science planetarium shows, Elemental and Particle/Wave. In 2023 she received ANAT’s Synapse Artist Residency and co-created an art installation for Science Gallery Melbourne’s exhibition, Dark Matters. Her new book is Stellar Atmospheres.

You can follow Alicia and learn more about her work here: 

https://www.aliciasometimes.com/

https://bookedout.com.au/find-a-speaker/author/alicia-sometimes/ 

https://www.instagram.com/sometimesalicia/

https://x.com/aliciasometimes 

https://sometimes2023.blog.anat.org.au/ 

https://corditebooks.org.au/products/stellar-atmospheres (Alicia’s new book)

Transcript: https://go.unimelb.edu.au/xw58

This week we had the great privilege of speaking with Dr Craig Cormick OAM. Craig is the Creative Director of ThinkOutsideThe. He is one of Australia’s leading science communicators, with over 30 years’ experience working with agencies such as CSIRO, Questacon and Federal Government Departments.

In 2014 he was awarded the Unsung Hero of Science Communication by the Australian Science Communicators, and in 2011 was a co-winner of the International Association of Public Participation’s national best practice award for the development of the Science and Technology Engagement Pathways (STEP) framework.

Craig has headed up several communications and marketing units, before moving to consultancy work. He specialised in communicating complex science to the general public – and in communicating the complex attitudes and beliefs of the public to scientists, particularly on topics of biotechnology and nanotechnology.

He has a broad background in both the theory and the practice of working with social attitudes to new technologies, and methods of community engagement, particularly on how different values influence attitudes and receptiveness to messages or behaviour change.

He has been a member of the Society of Risk Analysis and has published research papers on risk communications and risk perception, as well as giving many workshops and talks, both in Australia and overseas, on the differences between public and scientific perceptions of risk.

Craig has a particular interest in evidence-based, and client- and audience-driven, communications and marketing. He has also published more than 40 books and won many writing awards. 

You can follow Craig and learn more about his work here:

https://theconversation.com/profiles/craig-cormick-94194/articles

https://thinkoutsidethe.com.au/?page_id=27

https://www.facebook.com/craig.cormick

https://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-craig-cormick-oam-08352123/

https://twitter.com/craigcormick

Transcript: https://go.unimelb.edu.au/htv8