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The goals for the 5th Living Knowledge conference are: "What innovation is needed to guide research towards public concerns? How can civil society fully participate in the co-creation of knowledge? The 5th Living Knowledge Conference will focus on getting more insight into processes, and develop specific policy recommendations that resonate with public concerns and articulated research needs." On the site we see "PERARES (Public Engagement with Research And Research Engagement with Society) project aims to strengthen the interaction between researchers and Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) and citizens in Europe." We also see a description of science shops: "small entities that carry out scientific research in a wide range of disciplines - usually free of charge and - on behalf of citizens and local civil society." All these things would be worth looking further into to understand what guidelines people use or recommend for engaging others in scientific & technological change. In brief, they seem very sympatico to the idea of Case 4 of the course (http://ppol749.wikispaces.umb.edu/PBLEngagementCase).

So this seems to be the other theme emerging, how you work with individuals / the public / citizens in shaping scientific research and the dialogue around it.

an entry point to a checklist of conditions for organizers and facilitators to foster when running a collaborative process. The checklists are organized under four headings: Respect, Risk, Revelation, Re-engagement. The thinking behind these headings is, in brief, that a well-facilitated collaborative process keeps us listening actively to each other, fostering mutual Respect that allows Risks to be taken, elicits more insights than any one person came in with (Revelation), and engages us in carrying out and carrying on the plans we develop (Re-engagement). What we come out with is very likely to be larger and more durable than what any one person came in with; the more so, the more voices that are brought out by the process. The sequence of 4Rs grew out of an an annual series of experimental, interaction-intensive, interdisciplinary workshops that "foster collaboration among those who teach, study, and engage with the public about scientific developments and social change" (http://www.stv.umb.edu/newssc.html). Since we named the 4Rs, we have found ourselves using them to review and redesign our teaching, theories about learning, committee meetings, and, in general, the cultivation of collaborators.

The Center for Digital Storytelling engages people to share personal stories, bearing witness as related to their lives leading to action and positive change.

Narratives and frames are powerful things. It would seem that any endeavor would benefit from knowing what is a compelling "story" to engage the public. Youth development organizations use this tool quite a lot in their work.

I remember you had been talking about using story boards in one of the other cases. I am wondering if there is a way to use both of those ideas for Case 4.

For more than 30 years the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society's Philadelphia Green program has used horticulture to build community and improve the quality of life in Philadelphia's neighborhoods and downtown public spaces. In that time there have been significant signs of rebirth in the city, and the work of Philadelphia Green has played an important role in the environmental, social, economic, and aesthetic changes taking place.

It would be interesting to know how programs like this and other environmental stewardship and conservations efforts link to increased awareness, support and engagement in policy efforts.

The Genewatch (USA) website has abundant resources, in the form of links to what is going on and to other groups as well as an archive of 25 years of their magazine. Their role is to monitor new developments. Other than educating readers and getting them concerned, their many approach to getting people engaged seems to be to get them to sign petition and contact their elected representatives. (I looked for articles about teaching, but didn't find them easily if they are there.)

The Program link on their website provides a bunch of things that seem like they could be a good starting point for teaching and curriculum development. Maybe as the starting point for a PBL.

The goal of the GMO Education Network is to present factual and objective information about genetically engineered crop species. The site strives to be accessible to readers who are unfamiliar with the subject of plant biology while at the same time providing the detailed information necessary for people to synthesize independent and informed opinions about GMOs. It also seeks to promote constructive debate and discourse on the forum page to engage those on both sides of the GMO issue to articulate their positions in a factual and scientific manner. This wiki depends upon the community at large for it to be developed and updated. If you have an interest in contributing please visit the join page. If there is a topic which you would like to see covered that is not, please consider stubbing an article or posting on the forum.

Rhoda, I posted a resource above that talks about GMO regulation as anti-science activism. It is coming from a pro-business perspective. I wonder what forums would bring these opposing sides into "conversation" or "dialogue" with one another. Is there a meeting ground? Should there be?

The American Climate and Environmental Value Survey (ACEVS) is the third application of sophisticated psychographic research on American environmental and climate values. The goal of ACEVS is to increase the leverage, scale, reach, and most importantly, efficacy, of climate and environmental initiatives by empowering the movement with proven research and methodology for authentically engaging Americans in climate and environmental solutions, bringing these Americans to solutions on their own terms, in context of their choosing, and for their personal benefit.

This survey includes a section on what influences people (primarily the media). It also begins with the comment that "cap and trade" is now "toxic." It would be interesting to connect the dots here (as Oreskes & co-author do in Merchants of Doubt), so that we see who was behind the push against cap and trade. Ironically, cap and trade originated as a free market alternative to government regulation of how much pollution could be emitted.

Fred Singer!

Meredith Minkler reviews the current status and practice of CBR in the U.S. and abroad, providing reasons to undertake this admittedly more-complex path for public health research in particular (identifying questions that reflect real community concerns; achieving informed consent and building community capacity; increasing cultural sensitivity and validity of measurement tools, data interpretation, and interventions; uncovering critical lay knowledge; and improving participant recruitment and retention). Along with ethical issues, Minkler uses case study examples to highlight other challenges inherent in the practice, and provides some guidelines for engagement. To my mind, her review is balanced and raises several issues not touched upon by other scholarly writings re: CBR process and practice.

ResIST is a multinational collaborative research partnership that seeks to explore the role that science and technology in increasing inequalities but also the ways in which science and technology can address these same inequities. The research teams from Germany, Malta, Mozambique, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, South Africa, Turkey, the UK and the US are engaged in 5 separate but coordinated research endeavors. ResIST provides a nice template for how transnational knowledge building might work.

This piece talks about activism that hampers scientific research, innovation and industries that are related to things suc as "pesticides, food additives, chemicals in general, pharmaceuticals, nuclear power, and biotechnology." The article states that the scientific illiteracy of the general public makes it easy for activists to generate support for increased regulation and dampening of efforts in these areas. How do you help communities assess scientific information? How do you help them look at not only the research, but the context of the research? How should informed decisions about potentially harmful technologies and processes be handled? How do you support and engage in honest and open dialogue and debate about complex and unknown outcomes?

A theory that seeks to explain how, why, and at what rate new ideas and technology spread through cultures. Everett Rogers, a professor of rural sociology, popularized the theory in his 1962 book Diffusion of Innovations. He said diffusion is the process by which an innovation is communicated through certain channels over time among the members of a social system.

This article reflects on the similarities, differences and complexities of science and democracy. Indeed, science is present in our daily lives and democracy through our actions that foster society are present daily as well. Because of the impact of science on society, democracy may be seen as a core element in guiding science towards the greater good. Nevertheless, government use and intervention of science may not be always so. Therefore, it is the people's right and obligation to engage government and scientists reminding them of the benefits but also the risks of their projects and objectives. Science and business may create a covenient and profitable conduit for developing new inventions and advancing science. However, through democracy, we may and should remind them of the ethical implications of their discoveries and the need to work for the greater good and benefitting all. An interesting article that also provides some insights about Obama's policies on Science.

I've just been reading some papers from the journal of economic education and I got the need to share this one with all of you. Mind mapping seems like an exciting resource very close to concept mapping. The authors note that these resources are crucial in creating a more engaging and collaborative learning environment. Although they try to test the degree of learning among 39 students, their results are dubious do to the small sample size and only suggestive. Yet the conclusion remains, these resources create a more active learning class motivating students and creating more class participation.