In this interview, we talk to two professionals who have each worked in different research fields which have utilized citizen scientists as part of their profession and research.
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Do volunteers in citizen science have different motivation profiles?
Volunteers in citizen science (CS) have different kinds of motivations for participation, ranging from e.g. topic interest, supporting science to personal recognition. Information regarding the existence and characteristics of motivation profile groups of volunteers remains unclear.
Sticking in your professional domain or trying something new?
Citizen science (CS) projects encompass a variety of different disciplines (e.g. health, biology, education). However, it is not clear whether volunteers’ working i.e. professional discipline is related to the discipline of their selected project.
Do citizen scientists use different technologies depending on their age in CS activities?
Citizen science engages adults of all age groups. According to participants, which are technologies they use to participate in CS activities? What are the differences between different age groups and the technologies they use?
Developing citizen science: 5 evidence-based recommendations for policymakers
Since November 2019 the international research project CS Track has been combining traditional social-science methods with web-based and computational analytics in order to systematically survey the field of Citizen Science.
8 recommendations for institutions looking to support citizen science initiatives
Since November 2019 the international research project CS Track has been combining traditional social-science methods with web-based and computational analytics in order to systematically survey the field of Citizen Science.
How to improve citizen science projects?
Since November 2019 the international research project CS Track has been combining traditional social-science methods with web-based and computational analytics in order to systematically survey the field of Citizen Science.
CS Track publishes policy recommendations based on project results
Since November 2019 the international research project CS Track has been combining traditional social-science methods with web-based and computational analytics in order to systematically survey the field of Citizen Science. Based on our findings, we have now...
Why citizen science cannot answer the question of the democratisation of science
We are delighted to announce that the article entitled "Why citizen science cannot answer the question of the democratisation of science" written by Michael Strähle and Christine Urban has been published in the conference proceedings of...
CS Track paper published in Digital Health
We are delighted to announce that the article entitled "An analytics approach to health and healthcare in citizen science communications on Twitter" written by Fernando Martínez-Martínez, David Roldán-Álvarez, Estefanía Martín, and H...
CS Track paper published in conference proceedings of the STS Conference Graz 2022
We are delighted to announce that the article entitled "Inclusion and exclusion in citizen science: A matter of context" written by Michael Strähle and Christine Urban has been published in the conference proceedings of the STS Conference Graz 2022 that took place...
CS Track papers published in Conference Proceedings of the Citizen Science Conference 2022
We are happy to announce that the paper entitled "Identifying learning dimensions in citizen science projects" written by Marius Oesterheld, Vincent Schmid-Loertzer, Miriam Calvera-Isabal, Ishari Amarasinghe, Patricia Santos and Yaela N Golumbic, and the paper...
Recommendations for policy-makers arising from CS Track investigations into Citizen Science, online seminar, 25 January
Online Seminar on Wednesday, 25 January 2023, 14:00 – 15:00 CET The main mission of the CS Track project has been to observe and analyse the phenomena of citizen science using empirical and theoretical studies. Based on these studies, the team have constructed a...
Mapping Sustainable Development Goals to Citizen Science projects
Main aim of the study This work presents opportunities, achievements, and future challenges in using computational analytics to better understand the connection between CS and the SDGs. The work in its status does not fully cover SDGs in CS, but it evaluates and shows...
An explorative study on the effects of the recent pandemic on online Citizen Science: lessons learnt for improving project management and implementation
The study aimed at assessing the pandemic’s impact on online CS participation and capturing CS project coordinators’ experience of the pandemic and their actions in managing the pandemic’s effects.
Report on a Survey among Organisers of Citizen Science Projects
Collect data on some project characteristics which cannot be answered by visiting project websites.
Is it a match? Motivations on citizen science volunteers and recruitment arguments in project descriptions
This study aims at understanding how the alignment between the motivational factors of CS participants and the recruitment speech used in the projects’ description is, by performing quantitative triangulation of data collected through a survey about 12 motivational factors for participating in a CS project, and the manual analysis of the projects’ descriptions available in Zooniverse website.
Educational uses of CS data
The study aim is to investigate how a combination of methods (such as data analysis, computational or quantitative methods) could be applied to gather CS projects information to support teacher’s practice and inspire them.
How to automate the extraction and analysis of information for educational purposes
In this case study we intended to reflect on how the online data about CS is shared and communicated in the websites, how could this data be extracted massively and stored in a central database to, later be analysed with different purposes. One of its, studied in this article, is the usage of all the information in educational contexts.
Citizen science project descriptions as science communication texts – the good, the bad, and the ugly
Project descriptions are a central element of a Citizen Science project’s online presence and thus play a key role in recruiting volunteers. Very often, they are the first point of contact between a project and prospective participants. As such, they need to be reader-friendly and accessible, spark interest, contain all the necessary practical information, and motivate readers to join by explaining convincingly how they will benefit from participating in the project. The purpose of this study was to examine whether the project descriptions stored in the CS Track database meet these criteria.
Research Areas in Citizen Science: One analysis of the CS Track database
One of the main objectives of CS Track project has been to realise an explorative study of CS projects in Europe, with the aim to categorize, cluster and build a database of CS projects that would allow an analysis of them. This has allowed: (1) to compile of a database of CS projects (and their corresponding CS activities) in the European Union and Associated Countries; (2) to document of a collection of these projects to explore their availability of data for further analysis following the knowledge gaps identified by the literature review.
CS Track framework for investigating citizen science
A CS Track team of researchers including Reuma De-Groot, Yaela N Golumbic, Fernando Martínez Martínez and H. Ulrich Hoppe recently published a paper entitled “Developing a framework for investigating Citizen Science through a combination of web analytics and social...
CS Track publishes paper about developing a novel framework for investigating Citizen Science
A CS Track team of researchers including Reuma De-Groot, Yaela N Golumbic, Fernando Martínez Martínez and H. Ulrich Hoppe recently published a paper entitled “Developing a framework for investigating Citizen Science through a combination of web analytics and social science methods – the CS Track perspective”. This article presents the project’s framework that aims to complement existing methods for evaluating CS, address gaps in current observations of the citizen science landscape and integrate findings from multiple studies and methodologies.
Identifying learning dimensions in CS project descriptions
Educational impacts of participation, such as the development of scientific skills or increased awareness about biodiversity and conservation, are one of the most widely discussed aspects of CS. Whereas most existing studies investigate perceived or observed learning gains of citizen scientists, this study took an alternative perspective by examining learning-related aspects in textual self-representations of CS projects—namely in project descriptions posted online. The aim was to determine which dimensions of learning are reflected most prominently in CS project descriptions.
CS Track paper on volunteer engagement published in CollabTech 2022
We are delighted to announce that the article entitled “Does Volunteer Engagement Pay Off? An Analysis of User Participation in Online Citizen Science Projects” written by our colleagues Simon Krukowski, Ishari Amarasinghe, Nicolás Felipe...
TIME4CS’ online event on embedding citizen science in your institution, 6 December
TIME4CS will run an online interactive workshop on 6 December from 10:00 - 12:00 CET about how to contribute to fostering the adoption of citizen science as research methodology within your organization through the use of institutional roadmaps. ...
Citizen Science and Planetary Health – Impressions from the ECSA Conference 2022
3 keynotes, 35 sessions, 101 posters and more than 400 participants – in early October citizen science experts from all over the world gathered in Berlin to attend the biennial ECSA conference, Europe’s largest citizen science event.
How to write an engaging citizen science project description
The CS Track team members Dr. Yaela Golumbic (The Mofet institute; The Steinhardt Museum of Natural History, Israel) and Marius Oesterheld (Wissenschaft im Dialog, Germany) have recently published a ten-step guide to writing citizen science project descriptions that...
Citizen Science Community meets in force in Berlin
The biannual ECSA conference organised under the theme Citizen Science for Planetary Health got off to a great start in Berlin on 5 October with a welcome reception in the Museum of Natural History. The surroundings, dominated by dinosaurs and other fossils was a fine...
How to write project descriptions that spark interest and attract volunteers – a 10-step guide
Over the past 18 months, several research groups within the CS Track consortium have analysed project descriptions stored in the CS Track database from different perspectives (focusing for instance on research area, correlation with the SDG framework, educational aspects etc.).
Empirical evidence on the characteristics of citizen scientists and what we can learn from it, online seminar, 20 October
Online Workshop on Thursday, 20 October 2022, 14:00 – 15:00 CET The webinar will provide perspectives and insights on the characteristics of citizen scientists based on our research. Presentations in the webinar will address central themes on how citizen...
Coming to terms with the multiple possible meanings of the term CS. The Activities-Dimensions-Grid of Citizen Science, online seminar, 8 December
Online Workshop on Thursday, 8 December 2022, 14:00 – 15:00 CET Explanation of the grid. How it was developed and why., e. g. voluntary work versus influencing policies versus education versus making. How to place a CS activity. Obvious differences in potential...
CS Track paper on automated analysis published in Revista Comunicar journal
We are happy to announce that article entitled "How to automate the extraction and analysis of information for educational purpose" written by our colleagues Miriam Calvera-Isabal, Patricia Santos Rodriguez, H.-Ulrich Hoppe, & Cleo Schulten has been published...
Final face to face partner meeting at the Dead Sea
Mofet hosted a busy final face to face project meeting over the last 3 days at the Dead Sea. This meeting comes at a critical time in the life of the project when all of the scientific work comes together to inform policy recommendations. It was a really useful...
European projects and their impact on policy – an interview with Rosa Arias, D-NOSES Coordinator
During the Engaging Citizen Science Conference in Aarhus, Denmark, in April 2022, partners in the SensJus project had the opportunity to find out more about a distinctive case demonstrating the impact of citizen science in steering environmental regulation.
Collection of Case Studies of Institutional Adoption of Citizen Science
Mapping and analysing institutional Citizen Science adoption – are there any guidelines that can be provided to Research Performing Organisations (RPOs) regarding the transformation to support Citizen Science? What are the most desirable pathways to accomplish a sustainable institutional integration of citizen science in RPOs?
What are the most pressing concerns of those working with Citizen Science in a post-pandemic world – an interview with Gitte Kragh
Gitte Kragh is a postdoc at Aarhus University, ecologist at NORDECO, co-founder of the Danish Citizen Science Network, and a Board member of the European Citizen Science Association (ECSA).
ECSA 2022, 5-8 October, Berlin, Germany
The ECSA Conference 2022 will be held from October 5-8 in Berlin, Germany. This year researchers from all disciplines, scientists, practitioners, activists, funders, policymakers, non-governmental organizations, artists, and other interested citizens worldwide...
Integrating Open and Citizen Science into Higher Education, 31 August, Leiden, the Netherlands
INOS project is organizing a workshop at Leiden University on 31 August to share the resources they developed, for integrating citizen science and open science into higher education institutions and libraries. This workshop aims to share these results with library and...
Resources for using citizen science in higher education, CSA Webinar, 10 August
Citizen science can be a great tool for engaging and teaching undergraduates, even if you only devote a small amount of time to it. You are invited to join leaders from across institutions and disciplines to explore the available resources for educators looking to...
A self-guided module on teaching in higher education with citizen science available
Teaching in Higher Education with Citizen Science is an online, self-guided module by the NC State University, USA that will provide you with information on some of the benefits of including citizen science in your undergraduate courses, practical strategies for doing...
Miriam Calvera-Isabal presents CS Track project findings in multiple occasions
Over the past few months, our colleague Miriam Calvera-Isabal (UPF) has presented the CS Track project and our research findings at different conferences and project meetings, including TEASPIL, H2O Learn and LASI Spain. She explained how CS Track has centralized...
Understanding the nature of Citizen Science in a rapidly changing world, half-day symposium, 8 October, Berlin
CS Track and ECSA teams are organising a half-day symposium under the theme "Understanding the nature of Citizen Science in a rapidly changing world" on 8 October, 9:00-13:00 CET in Berlin. This symposium aims at sharing these results and findings and discussing their...
Free online consultation on Co-Evaluation Principles for Citizen Social Science
The co-evaluation approach was introduced and applied by the CoAct project in collaboration with the local research teams across three initiatives that address global social concerns (youth employment, mental healthcare, and environmental justice). Based on these...
How does the Citizen Science community use hashtags when discussing e-Health?
We analysed 17,122 Citizen Science tweets filtered with Health keywords in order to answer the following questions: What are the most used hashtags in the e-Health discussion? Are hashtags normally used alone or alongside others on the same theme?
Congratulations on your Ph.D., Dr.Nicolás Felipe Gutiérrez Páez!
We congratulate our colleague Dr. Nicolás Felipe Gutiérrez Páez who defended his thesis "Motivations, engagement, and incentives in online communities: contributions to theory, data analytics and design" on 22 June 2022 and was awarded Cum Laude.
How are tweets distributed for each Sustainable Development Goal within the Citizen Science Twitter community?
In this article, we analysed linkages between tweets and SDGs in our dataset by means of classification algorithms. In addition, the network of retweets for each SDG is provided.
SDG discussion in the Citizen Science community of Twitter
Through this Twitter analysis it was possible to demonstrate that some SDGs are much more discussed than others among the Citizen Science community of Twitter.
The importance of the few – how a minority of power users shape most of the discourse in CS forums
Analysing the discourse in discussion forums of CS projects can help to understand underlying patterns of collaborative knowledge creation and to identify highly engaged users. We ask the question: What can the quantitative analysis of forum data tell us about these patterns?
Describing your citizen science project – How to present your project and recruit volunteers, online workshop, 7 July
Online Workshop on Thursday, 7 July 2022, 14:00 – 15:30 CET In this installment of our webinar series, CS Track researchers will share tips and tricks for writing informative and engaging project descriptions and analyse concrete examples (both positive and negative)...
A short introduction to the CS Track Analytics Workbench
How can we make the CS Track database of Citizen Science projects interactively accessible for the purposes of interest-driven retrieval, navigation and comparative analysis as well as for checking and correcting existing information items and adding new ones? To achieve this, we have developed the Analytics Workbench.
Expert interviews highlight citizen science benefits, pitfalls and caveats
The CS Track research team, led by partners Christine Urban and Michael Strähle from the Wissenschaftsladen Wien – Science Shop Vienna, has published a report called Conceptual Framework for Analytics Tools.
CS Track published a report about the conceptual framework for analytics tools
The CS Track research team, led by partners Christine Urban and Michael Strähle from the Wissenschaftsladen Wien - Science Shop Vienna, has published a report called Conceptual Framework for Analytics Tools. This document maps citizen science landscapes in the...
Communities in Citizen Science. Notes from the Engaging Citizen Science Conference 2022
On April 25-26, Aarhus University hosted the first major international f2f conference on Citizen Science since the beginning of the Covid 19 pandemic.
Citizen science to inspire educators – The importance of metadata and open data, online workshop, 14 June
Online Workshop on Tuesday, 14 June 2022, 14:00 – 15:30 CET Social media and online platforms are used by citizen science projects to share information about their work, how to participate, and motivate citizens to join them but also as a research tool. CS Track is...
CS Track researchers chaired session on Citizen Science at STS Graz 2022
On May 2, 2022 our team members Michael Strähle and Christine Urban (Wissenschaftsladen Wien – Science Shop Vienna) chaired the session Inclusion and Exclusion in Citizen Science and presented a paper on this topic at STS Graz 2022. The session included presentations...
CS Track researchers invited to present at the University of Vienna
On May 5, 2022 our team members Michael Strähle and Christine Urban (Wissenschaftsladen Wien – Science Shop Vienna) gave an invited presentation at the University of Vienna's Department of Science and Technology Studies. The presentation was part of an event on...
New models to help us understand patterns of participation in citizen science activities
The CS Track team has released a new report entitled Models to identify background factors associated with the CS activity. It introduces how the CS Track team created 6 models with the aim of developing a deeper understanding of how different factors (e.g. gender, age, roles in CS) are associated with different forms of participation in CS activities.
IMDEA’s views on Involving Citizens in the Circular Economy
Javier Dufour is the head of the Systems Unit and Lorena Martinez is responsible for communication and image at IMDEA Energy in Spain. The research at this Madrid-based research centre focuses on determining the sustainability of any energy system.
Citizen Science Conference (hybrid), 12 May, Enschede, the Netherlands
Societal impact is increasingly central to scientific research. How does new knowledge contribute to solving major issues in society? And how can we gain knowledge that is actually beneficial for society? Scientists are motivated to put their knowledge into practice,...
CS Track contributes to a special Horizon Magazine issue on citizen science
CS Track coordinator, Raul Drachman, recently contributed to an article about measuring the impact of citizen science published in a special Horizon Magazine issue. In this article, he shared his observations that are based on CS Track project findings including...
Learning from others – marketing the science and engaging the citizens
Marketing and motivation studies highlighted the importance of knowing more about participants. Framing and user experience experts showed how to convert knowledge into tailored approaches that enhance engagement and retention. Other fields, including the world of commerce, have potential lessons for citizen science practitioners, especially those involved in top-down, mass participatory projects that require high levels of engagement.
Data donation and Citizen Science – an interview with Elissa Redmiles, Max Planck Institute for Software Systems
Dr. Elissa M. Redmiles is a faculty member and research group leader of the Safety & Society group at the Max Planck Institute for Software Systems. She has additionally served as a consultant and researcher at multiple institutions, including Microsoft Research, Facebook, the World Bank, the Center for Democracy and Technology, and the University of Zurich.
Partner meeting in Barcelona boosts research collaboration
Pompeu Fabra University (UPF) hosted a busy project meeting over the last 3 days in the lovely Poblenou Campus in Barcelona. This meeting comes at a critical time in the life of the project when much of the planned triangulation work comes to the fore and the various...
CS Track introduces new models for analysing citizen science activities
The CS Track team has released a new report entitled Models to identify background factors associated with the CS activity. The proposed models are used to deepen our understanding of citizen scientists’ backgrounds and their involvement in citizen science activities....
Science communication in CS projects – strategies and tools, online workshop, 3 May 2022
Online Workshop on Tuesday, 3 May 2022 14:00 – 15:30 CET During this interactive webinar, members of the CS Track team will share strategies for science communication in citizen science projects, provide an overview of relevant software and resources, and help...
CS Track researchers to present at EASST 2022
We are delighted to announce that our team members Christine Urban and Michael Strähle (Wissenschaftsladen Wien – Science Shop Vienna) are going to be presenting at the EASST 2022 Conference (6-9, July) in Madrid, Spain. They will give a presentation entitled...
ECSA Conference 2022, Call for proposals
The 4th ECSA Conference taking place from 5-8 October in Berlin, Germany runs under the cross-cutting theme of Citizen Science for Planetary Health. The concept of planetary health is based on the understanding that human health and human civilization depend on...
More information on replicable models – just one of the priorities for CS Track stakeholders
In order to better tailor our work to the needs of our different stakeholders, the CS Track team led a series of focus group discussions in September. These focus groups directly involved over 30 people coming from different stakeholder communities including policy-makers and officers, platform and support agency representatives, people interested in CS from an educational perspective and CS project leaders, participants and researchers.
IMDEA Energy. Communicating science to drive citizen engagement in the transition to a Circular Economy model
IMDEA Energy is a research center created by the Community of Madrid in Spain, whose objectives are to promote and carry out R&D activities related to energy, especially for the promotion of renewable energies and clean energy technologies that allow progress towards a sustainable energy system.
CSI-COP publishes their 5th Newsletter
The European CSI-COP project has published their 5th Newsletter. In this edition they feature an interview of one of CSI-COP’s partners: Dr. Tiberius Ignat of Immer Besser. Tiberius explains a parent’s dilemma of wanting to provide his children with the wealth of...
12 recommendations for addressing future challenges through citizen science
The COVID-19 pandemic exposed an opportunity to improve the outcomes of citizen science in response to emerging challenges.
CS Track study investigates the potential of citizen science to respond to emerging challenges
The CS Track team of researchers led by Dr. Anne Turbe (Ecoscope) and have recently published a study that investigates the potential of citizen science to respond to emerging challenges. This report includes an analysis of Covid-19 citizen science projects using a...
Marius Oesterheld to give a presentation at the Bürger schaffen Wissen event, 25 February
Our colleague Marius Oesterheld is going to give a short presentation at the online event organised by Bürger schaffen Wissen on 25 February, 12:00-13:00 CET. Citizen Science projects and initiatives are enriching the European landscape - both on a national and...
Analyzing Citizen Science Projects using Web-based Tools, online workshop 15 March 2022
Online Workshop on Tuesday 15 March 2022 14:00 – 15:30 CET This workshop is about exploring a web-based tool (analytics workbench) that can be used to collect information about citizen science projects. It is based on current work in the European CS Track project,...
Questioning the term “citizen science project”
Citizen science has, at least in Europe, turned into an umbrella term for a lot of very different practices.
The use of (not) defining Citizen Science
The term ‘Citizen Science’ has had a remarkable career in terms of scientific publications and funding schemes. Citizen science policies are either already developed or under development in many parts of the world.
How do different participants contribute to the knowledge-building discourse in online citizen science projects?
It is expected that the discussion boards in online CS projects provide a space for knowledge-building.
Webinar on how citizens can play an active role in the advance of ground-breaking research, 24 March
REINFORCE (Research Infrastructures FOR citizens in Europe) project is hosting a high-level roundtable and interactive workshop entitled "How citizens can play an active role in the advance of ground-breaking research?" on 24 March, 15:00-16:30 CET. Speakers at the...
A colourful toolbox: Health Citizen Science under the GDPR
On 12 and 13 October 2021, the SensJus project convened a workshop on Health-Citizen Science Dilemmas under the EU General Data Protection Regulation 2016/679 (GDPR), at the Brocher Foundation, Geneva. The workshop explored the scarcely...
SciStarter publishes book for aspiring citizen scientists
The Field Guide to Citizen Science, from the expert team at SciStarter, provides everything newcomers need to get involved with citizen science. Readers will learn what citizen science is, how to succeed and stay motivated when participating in a project, and how the...
RIAS gives talk at the Karlsruhe Institute for Technology on web based analytics
As a follow-up of the Analytics Workbench workshop in November 2021, the RIAS group were invited to give a talk in the speaker series on Digital Citizen Science at the prestigious Karlsruhe Institute for Technology (KIT). The presentation entitled “Web-based Analytics...
A new major driver in bottom-up action to tackle climate change
A new international project AURORA (“Achieving a new European Energy Awareness”) has been launched to empower the people of Europe to take ownership of the climate change debate. The project fosters an explicitly citizen-led, bottom-up approach compared to the more...
Investigating the potential of citizen science to respond to COVID-19 challenges
How has the citizen science community responded to the COVID-19 pandemic? A content analysis-based study examining projects’ characteristics and activities.
The Role of Citizens in EU Missions Implementation (online event), 8 February
The TIME4CS consortium is hosting their 1st Citizen Science Helix Event on The Role of Citizens in EU Missions Implementation on Tuesday, 8 February. EU Missions are a novelty of the Horizon Europe research and innovation programme. They will engage with citizens to...
CS Track team members to present at ECSA and Engaging Citizen Science conferences
We are delighted to announce that our team members are going to be presenting at the Engaging Citizen Science (25-26 April) and ECSA 2022 (5-8 October) conferences. A poster "Individual Learning Outcomes in Citizen Science Projects" will be presented and the analytics...
Engaging Citizen Science Conference 2022, 25-26 April, Aarhus University, Denmark
The Engaging Citizen Science Conference will promote knowledge sharing among the citizen science community. The aim of the conference is to engage citizen science researchers, practitioners, and citizens in sharing research, ideas, and innovations in order to make the...
CS Track introduces new framework to categorise and characterise Citizen Science activities
The CS Track research team led by Christine Urban and Michael Strähle (Wissenschaftsladen Wien - Science Shop Vienna) has recently published a new report on Citizen Science which includes an extensive literature review and consideration of Citizen Science from...
Citizen Science in Schools: Predictors and Outcomes of Participating in Voluntary Political Research
Citizen science research has become a popular approach in youth education. Findings suggest that females are more motivated to learn from the project. Participation in the project slightly increased science interest, but not science efficacy. However, it did increase both political interest and efficacy.
Why is the protection of online privacy important to the Citizen Science community? – an interview with Huma Shah from CSI-COP
Huma Shah is an Assistant Professor and Researcher in AI at Coventry University in the UK. She is a passionate defender of online privacy. She is currently directing the science on the EU-funded CSI-COP project. This aims to raise awareness of citizens’ right to privacy online, and to mobilise citizen scientists from across Europe and beyond to investigate the different types of trackers in websites and apps.
Geneva Trialogue, 17 March
This year’s Geneva Trialogue's theme is Open Innovation for Education and the event will be held on 17 March. Geneva Trialogue 2022 focuses on the global challenge of scaling education to tackle the SDGs. With open innovation as the compass, novel...
UNESCO Science Commission adopts Recommendation on Open Science
The UNESCO recommendation on Open Science has been unanimously adopted in its entirety by Member States during the Science Commission plenary in November 2021 which is a milestone for Open Science and Citizen Science practitioners. During the General Conference...
CS Track project researchers to present at Austrian Citizen Science Conference 2022
We're delighted to announce that our colleagues Christine Urban and Michael Strähle (Wissenschaftsladen Wien - Science Shop Vienna) will be presenting a poster and a paper at the 7th Austrian Citizen Science Conference. The paper will tackle the issue as to why...
Special collection on citizen science in higher education published
Citizen Science: Theory and Practice journal has just released a new special collection on citizen science in Higher Education. This special collection explores the ways both online and field-based citizen science can be integrated in higher education as a tool for...
EU report on open science & societal engagement in research
The EU Commission has recently published a new report entitled "Enabling open science and societal engagement in research". This report presents insights and recommendations from a workshop held on 1 July 2021 attended by beneficiaries of the Science with and for...
What SDG is the most popular among the CS community on Twitter?
Our colleagues David Roldán-álvarez, Fernando Martínez-Martínez, Estefanía Martín from URJC have recently published an article "Understanding Discussions of Citizen Science Around Sustainable Development Goals in Twitter" in the IEEE Xplore journal. This paper...
How social network analysis reveals significant variables in Citizen Science projects: the Chimp & See case
Chimp & See is one of the projects of the Zooniverse platform, which is one of the largest citizen science web portals, was initiated in 2015 by the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. The aim of the project is to learn more about the culture, population size and demography of chimpanzees in specific regions of Africa.
Citizen science and SDGs to inspire educators workshops on 10 & 17 December
We're delighted to announce that our colleague Miriam Isabal Calvera (Universitat Pompeu Fabra) is hosting 2 workshops for educators in collaboration with Scientix, the community for science education in Europe. During these workshops participants will:➔ Learn about...
Computational analysis techniques can provide significant insights into Citizen Science
One of the central characteristics of the CS Track approach to investigating citizen science projects and activities is to focus on underlying types of participation, collaboration and knowledge creation. This perspective comprises semantic and pragmatic aspects of...
Biodiversity citizen science projects: What are the benefits for the participants?
Biodiversity citizen science projects investigate, for example, which species of plants or animals exist in an area and how many individuals of each species live in that area. Such projects involve citizen scientists in identifying and monitoring biological diversity and collecting biodiversity data. With the help of citizen scientists, researchers can collect large amounts of such data that they would not be able to collect on their own. We wanted to know how citizen scientists benefit from their participation in biodiversity citizen science projects.
CS Track workshop participants learn how to use analytics workbench
On Tuesday 16 November the CS Track team ran a workshop about a web-based tool called the analytics workbench that can be used to collect information about citizen science projects. This tool was developed by project partner RIAS. 22 participants from 10 different...
What are the boundaries of citizen science? Learning from a vignette study
Citizen science has expanded rapidly over the past decade. As a result defining citizen science and its boundaries remains a challenge, and this is reflected in the literature—for example in the proliferation of typologies and definitions. There is a need for identifying areas of agreement and disagreement within the citizen science practitioners community on what should be considered citizen science.
How do citizen science activities develop and work? Computational analysis techniques can help us find out
A cornerstone of the CS Track project’s approach to investigating how citizen science (CS) activities develop and work is the use of computational analysis techniques applied to digital sources and traces to characterise and analyse these activities in terms of interactions within certain projects, the interplay with “official” science and their interaction with society.
Citizen Science Handbook published
The community of Citizen Science practitioners in Zurich, including researchers at the University of Zurich and ETH Zurich, and citizens have just published their Citizen Science Handbook. It is a practical guide on how to successfully design and run co-created...
EUHubs4Data’s survey to help map citizen engagment
EUHubs4Data is a EU-funded project that will build a European federation of Data Innovation Hubs and connect them with data incubators and platforms, SME networks, AI communities, skills and training organisations and open data repositories. Project partners are...
The Formosa Case: A Step Forward on the Acceptance of Citizen-Collected Evidence in Environmental Litigation?
Through a case law analysis of the Formosa ruling, we explore how citizen-collected evidence influenced the judge’s ruling. Although the case has unique features, we identify lessons learned for other citizen-run monitoring initiatives, to strengthen their voice within environmental litigation. We close by suggesting future research avenues, especially in Europe, where the discussion is still in its infancy.
Increased knowledge generates more positive attitudes to science by citizen science participation
Can knowledge foster positive attitudes toward science in CS projects? Research on the public understanding of science has found that the relationship between attitudes toward science and general knowledge of scientific content is only small. We investigated whether this relationship and its direction is stronger in CS projects because these projects address specific knowledge such as wildlife ecology. Our findings indicated that citizens’ knowledge about wildlife improved their attitudes toward science later on.
Citizen Science: Bridging the gap between Formal and Informal Science? – an interview with Romain Julliard from MOSAIC, France
Professor Romain Julliard is director of MOSAIC, a scientific unit located in the Museum of National History and Sorbonne University in France which was set up in 2020 with the specific aim of assisting researchers in developing citizen science projects.
Knowledge building and roles in Citizen Science – findings from the CS Track survey 2021
Citizen science entails the participation of the public and professional scientists in scientific activities in order to expand scientific knowledge and understanding. This involves participants adopting different roles for completing specific tasks which can shape overall learning experiences.
CS Track project researchers to present at the GWTF Annual Meeting on 19 November
CS Track project researchers Michael Strähle and Christine Urban from Wissenschaftsladen Wien will give a presentation in German on contexts of inclusion and exclusion in citizen science at the GWTF Annual Meeting 2021 (18 - 19 November 2021). The session of which...
Citizen Science and policy-making – an interview with Sven Schade from the JRC
Sven Schade is Scientific Policy Officer at the Joint Research Center (JRC) of the European Commission. Recently he was one of the speakers at the Citizen Science for Policy across Europe webinar organised by EU-Citizen.
Analyzing Citizen Science Projects using Web-based Tools, online workshop, 16 November 2021
Online Workshop on Tuesday 16 November 2021 14:00 – 15:30 CET This workshop is about exploring a web-based tool (“analytics workbench”) that can be used to collect information about citizen science projects. It is based on current work in the European CS Track...
1 in 5 citizen science projects are multidisciplinary
Citizen science has a foundation in traditional fields of science such as biology that remain strong today. However, based on the initial results of an international survey that began early 2021 by the CS Track team, it was discovered that 20% of citizen science...
EU-Citizen.Science final conference, 24-25 November
The EU-Citizen.Science platform, in collaboration with the ACTION project, will hold their final conference under the theme of "The future of citizen science: sharing experiences from the European community" on 24-25 November. The event will bring together the global...
Citizen Science and participatory evaluation and impact assessment – an interview with ZSI team in Austria
Stefanie Schuerz, Barbara Kieslinger, Teresa Schäfer and Katja Mayer all work at the Zentrum für Soziale Innovation GmbH/Centre for Social Innovation (ZSI) in Austria which has been at the cutting edge of Citizen Science in Europe for many years.
Discover what’s new in citizen science training on 27 October
EU-Citizen.Science contains a wide array of free, self-directed training modules on citizen science on its Moodle page. The themes of the training modules range from introduction to citizen science, research design and methods, engagement and impact to...
CitSciOZ21 virtual conference, 27 – 29 October 2021
“CitSciOz21: Celebrate, Communicate, Co-create” is an online virtual conference organised by the Australian Citizen Science Association that will take place 27 – 29 October 2021. Centered around the themes of Celebrate, Communicate, and Co-Create, this virtual...
Using citizen science data to monitor the Sustainable Development Goals: a bottom‐up analysis
Recent research suggests that citizen science projects see both valuable opportunities as well as deep-rooted barriers in linking their data to the SDGs.
The main motivation for taking part in CS activities is…
Although citizen science projects take on a variety of forms and scales, the motivation of those behind the scenes are similar. In fact, the CS Track team has learned from an ongoing survey that began this year that the interest in a particular theme or topic, being...
NEWSERA’s Policy Briefs pinpoint innovative ideas for citizen science initiatives
The most recent set of policy briefs from NEWSERA published on 28 September 2021 identify the challenges that citizen science initiatives may face when reaching out to different communities, and pinpoint innovative ideas to overcome difficulties...
Typical characteristics of citizen science (CS) participants
Citizen science (CS) activities have increasingly become diverse of both subject matter and objectives, creating diverse opportunities for people representing a variety of socio-economic backgrounds as well as experiences to come together and participate in science activities.
Citizen Science Podcast
Citizen Science: Stories of Science We Can All Do Together. is a podcast from SciStarter. This show spotlights the many different ways that individuals and communities are exploring and changing the world around them through public participation in science. Episodes...
“Citizen science – tools to achieve a real impact on policy-making” webinar, 12 October
This workshop will present key outcomes and lessons learned from projects that have successfully responded to various H2020 calls on improving air quality and urban mobility in European cities and reducing their carbon footprint, by enhancing citizen engagement. The...
Action project’s final masterclass on overarching policy recommendations taking place in November
In the course of 2021, ACTION is organising six masterclasses in five countries (Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Spain & the UK), each one aimed at the interaction of citizen science with policy. The pan-European masterclass on overarching policy recommendations in...
Call for abstracts for the Engaging Citizen Science Conference 2022 is open!
The Engaging Citizen Science Conference will promote knowledge sharing among the citizen science community. The aim of the conference is to engage citizen science researchers, practitioners, and citizens in sharing research, ideas, and innovations in order to make the...
Who takes part in Citizen Science projects & why?
Identifying who takes part in citizen science projects and understanding what motivates them are key aspects in building our understanding of citizen science. These aspects are at the heart of a recent White Paper published by the CS Track project which highlights interest in the theme, contributing to scientific research and opportunities to learn as key factors when it comes to motivation.
96% of citizen scientists use technology to take part in CS activities
Technology undoubtedly continues to play an important role in our daily lives. The CS Track survey that was launched at the beginning of 2021 has also underscored that the same can be said for those who participate in citizen science projects as 96% of survey...
Characteristics and nature of Citizen Science in Europe today
Citizen Science is changing and evolving as highlighted in the recent CS Track White Paper on Themes, Objectives and Participants. This white paper draws on the initial results of a large scale CS Track survey carried out in early 2021 which highlights an increasing use of technology, diversification in terms of themes and a re-assessment of the value that citizen science can bring to the individual as well as society as a whole.
The most typical citizen scientists are married men!
The activities in citizen science tend to involve a variety of people representing different walks of life - some at the professional level, some at the enthusiast level. Based on the initial results of a survey conducted by the CS Track team earlier this year, it was...
Science & You 2021 Conference, 16-19 November, Metz, France
Science communication is a booming and flourishing practice and operates increasingly in a global theatre. This year the University of Lorraine is inviting researchers and practitioners of science communication to come to Metz on 16-19 November 2021 to exchange views...
Conference paper on characterizing participation and interaction in a citizen science online community published
We are delighted to announce that the conference paper entitled "Using Network Analysis to Characterize Participation and Interaction in a Citizen Science Online Community", written by our project partners Ishari Amarasinghe, Sven Manske,...
Exploring the impact of a Citizen Science high school project
A study conducted in Norwegian high schools revealed that citizen science activities have positive impacts on learning, pro-environmental and pro-science attitudes, interest in scientific and environmental-related topics.
Citizen Science and policy-making – an interview with Linden Farrer from the European Commission
Linden Farrer from the European Commission talks about the current status and future perspectives for Citizen Science in Europe.
‘Generation Solar’: a new database for citizen science in the energy sector
Open Research Europe has recently published a case study that describes 'Generation Solar', which is an open database of small-scale solar photovoltaic installations. The web version of the app can already be accessed via this link and it can also be freely downloaded...
Onboarding Citizen Science and the role of research libraries: barriers and accelerators – Post Event Report
The workshop Onboarding Citizen Science and the role of research libraries: barriers and accelerators took place on 23 June 2021 during the LIBER 2021 Annual Conference. The participants of this interactive event discussed and shared their...
Survey into Citizen Science Strategies and Initiatives reveals a very mixed picture
The recent JRC report on Citizen Science Strategies and Initiatives in Europe highlights the different ways in which Citizen Science is supported and understood in Europe. The results of its survey show how Citizen Science is evolving and where the main barriers to its successful implementation lie.
Scientifica, 4-5 September, Zürich, Switzerland
The Scientifica conference will take place at ETH Zurich and the University of Zurich on 4-5 September, 2021 under the motto "Synthetic naturally". Scientifica offers a wide range of events in various formats for all ages including special activities for families and...
How to Reward Young Citizen Social Scientists?
The YOUCOUNT project team aims to develop ‘actionable’ knowledge of the positive drivers for social inclusion of disadvantaged young people. They are planning to invite citizen scientists to take part in case studies in 9 European countries and therefore it was...
Citizen Science Projects: How to Make a Difference?
The University of Dundee is offering a course entitled "Citizen Science Projects: How to Make a Difference?" on the Futurelearn platform. In this course, you’ll discover many different types of projects and how to get involved. You’ll find out how to lead a project,...
Requirements and motivations of quadruple helix stakeholders for active engagement in the Citizen Science
The INCENTIVE project aims to demonstrate the potential of citizen science through the co-creation, establishment and assessment of Citizen Science Hubs in four EU Universities: University of Twente (NL), Autonomous University of Barcelona (ES), Aristotle University...
The importance of understanding motivation in Citizen Science projects
Understanding what motivates people to take part in Citizen Science activities is important. While the reasons people give for getting involved vary greatly, research is starting to show interesting connections between the different drivers and demographics.
What technical devices/platforms are used most by Citizen Scientists in their projects?
Nowadays, there are numerous forms of technology ranging from audio recorders to smartphones as well as technological platforms, e.g., social media, that equip citizen scientists with the necessary tools to carry out their activities or projects of interest.
Citizen Social Science School (online), 13-23 September
Citizen Social Science School: Social Dimensions in Citizen Science will take place online from 13-23 September. The main goal of this event is to offer academic researchers a common space and a shared time to reflect, discuss, learn, and receive practical...
2020-2021 EUA Open Science Survey results published
This report presents the outcomes of the 2020-2021 EUA Open Science Survey and provides evidence-based recommendations for institutions, researchers, research funders and policymakers on the transition towards Open Science. The 2020-2021 EUA Open Science Survey...
Open Science Fair, 20-23 September
OS Fair 2021 aims to bring together and empower open science communities and services; to identify common practices related to open science; to see what are the best synergies to deliver and operate services that work for many; and to bring experiences from all around...
Citizen Science and Open Learning: A Twitter perspective
Social networks, such as Twitter, are increasingly being investigated to capture online interactive participation. Although citizen science projects have been remarkably successful in advancing scientific knowledge, it is not known whether the educational aspect is considered in citizen science projects.
Characterising engagement in citizen science
Engaging a wide range of participants over time, is key to the successful operation of citizen science projects. But how can projects accomplish this? The short and perhaps simplistic answer is “know your audience” – The whole range of potential audiences your project may have.
CSaP published a report on future directions for citizen science and public policy
The Centre for Science and Policy (CSaP) in the UK has published a new report entitled "Future Directions for Citizen Science & Public Policy" in June, 2021. Over the past year CSaP has brought together policymakers and academics to discuss citizen science —...
JRC report on Citizen Science Strategies and Initiatives in Europe published
A technical report was recently published by the Joint Research Centre (JRC), the European Commission’s science and knowledge service, on Citizen Science Strategies and Initiatives in Europe. This report provides a synthetic summary of the findings stemming from three...
EU-Citizen.Science workroom, 21, 29 June and 6 July
The EU-Citizen.Science project team is organising a three-part workshop series on 21 June, 29 June, and 6 July. The events are free for the whole community, however the number of participants is limited to 50, therefore we encourage you to register here in advance....
CitSciOZ21 virtual conference, 27 – 29 October 2021
"CitSciOz21: Celebrate, Communicate, Co-create" is an online virtual conference organised by the Australian Citizen Science Association that will take place 27 – 29 October 2021. Centered around the themes of Celebrate, Communicate, and Co-Create, this virtual...
Economic considerations in Citizen Science
Examining the role of economic considerations in Citizen Science projects may yield some surprising conclusions, for example that those considerations may not be deemed by those involved in a project as important as could be expected. Greater attention seems to be paid to non-economic factors (e.g., educational gains).
Living Knowledge Online Festival, 28 June – 2 July
The Online Festival aims to bring together all those involved in doing or supporting research with, and for, communities in the setting of Science Shops. What can we learn from each other’s approaches? How can we collaborate? Which links have been forged and which...
Watch CS Track team present the first results from our survey
Organised jointly by BRITEC with Scientix, AmgenTeach, CS Track and the STEM Alliance, the 2021 STEM High Level Event “Bringing Research Into the Classroom” offered two days, 20 and 21 May, of online presentations and interactive sessions with researchers and...
Let’s talk about the benefits of Citizen Science for European policy-makers on 22 June
EU-Citizen.Science is inviting representatives from ministries across Europe and at the regional and local levels to engage in a discussion about citizen science and its benefits for policy making. The main aim of this event is to develop collaborations among policy...
Presenting CS Track at the annual German conference “Forum Citizen Science”, May 2021
Two days, six sessions with short presentations, nine working groups, ten workshops, thirty posters, and much more - the annual conference “Forum Citizen Science” in the beginning of May 2021 in a nutshell. For the first time, the conference was held digitally and -...
Unleashing the potential of Citizen Science Data for monitoring the SDGs
The Crowd4SDG project team are organising a panel discussion entitled "Unleashing the potential of Citizen Science Data for monitoring the SDGs" for National Statistical Offices and Systems that will take place on 27 May 2021 at 14:00 - 16:30 CET. The panel is...
CS Track database: first statistical results
The first version of the CS Track database contains a comprehensive collection of CS projects in the European Union and H2020 Associated Countries for data extraction and further analysis. This data was collected to both analyse and better understand citizen science.
CS Track presents first results from our survey at 2021 STEM High Level Event
Organised jointly by BRITEC with Scientix, AmgenTeach, CS Track and the STEM Alliance, the 2021 STEM High Level Event “Bringing Research Into the Classroom” will offer two days, 20 and 21 May, of online conferences and interactive sessions with researchers and...
Assessing the impact of citizen science
Assessments of impact in citizen science projects are rarely linked to specific indicators like impact on policies. MICS have created an impact assessment framework which is being used to underpin a software development involving both handcrafting and machine learning
Focus on Communication CS Track Workshop, 12 May
This third CS Track workshops at this year’s CitSci Virtual conference will focus on the approach and methods/tools used to communicate results. During this intro session, the team from URJC will present how they have set up the communications channels for the...
Focus on Analytics CS Track Workshop, 11 May
The second of three CS Track workshops at this year’s CitSci Virtual conference will focus on the approach and methods/tools used to analyse data. During this session, the team from RIAS will introduce the analytics work being carried out by the project team and the...
Focus on Information Management CS Track Workshop, 5 May
This first of three CS Track workshops at this year’s CitSci Virtual conference will be focused on the development of a database of CS projects and preliminary data analysis. During this event we will explain how the database was built, talk about the tools and...
Co-creation in Citizen Science explored in Environmental Epidemiology
Research into Citizen Science projects in the field of environmental epidemiology highlights the need for more effort in sharing information about collaborative processes
Research into using citizen science to study urban green spaces published
A new research paper entitled “When It Rains, It Pours: Integrating Citizen Science Methods to Understand Resilience of Urban Green Spaces” was recently published. Researchers used citizen science methods to assess flood mitigation potential of urban green spaces in...
New research article on “Citizen Sciencization” in Environmental Governance published
Michiel Van Oudheusden and Yasuhito Abe have recently published a research paper on the two trajectories of “Citizen Sciencization” in Environmental Governance. They conducted a comparative analysis of Safecast (radiation pollution; Japan) and CuriousNoses (air...
CitieS-Health’s Citizen Science toolkit
The CitieS-Health Toolkit provides a customised and interactive collection of adaptable instruments to empower anybody to engage communities to solve issues of common concerns and deploy actions for making your world a better place to live in. The tools are meant to...
URJC presents Community Platform at Science Education conference
CS Track partner URJC presented a virtual poster and a video presentation entitled “A case study on communication to boost Citizen Science social education: CS Track Community Platform” during the International New Perspectives in Science Education Conference on 18...
Are citizen science projects multi-disciplinary research activities?
We follow a computational approach to assign research areas and categories to textual project descriptions on the web platform Zooniverse. Using this, we quantify the degree of multi-disciplinarity for 218 citizen science projects.
April is CitSciMonth!
SciStarter in the the US is organising Citizen Science month in April. The idea is to provide lots of opportunities for people to have a go at citizen science and join a project no matter where they are on the globe. You can find out more on their website where there...
EU-Citizen.Science offer funding for 10 training modules
This new call from EU-Citizen.Science provides funding for the development, implementation and testing of 10 training modules on the topic of citizen science. These modules will be uploaded to the Moodle integration of the EU-Citizen.Science platform. The training...
Reconsidering Citizen Science, a CS Track point of view
Citizen Science is an emerging field of study that expands from the social sciences, through policies and the learning sciences. Partners in our consortium have different views about this interdisciplinary field. Several aspects of these views are summarised here.
MOOC on Citizen Science Education
The new BRITEC MOOC “A roadmap to citizen science Education” will provide materials and stories of implementation from innovative citizen science education projects. According to the organisers, Citizen Science Education is based on the assumption that teachers and...
What are the predominant research areas in citizen science projects?
Are most of the citizen science projects only about environmental research? We answer this question by analysing descriptions of 218 Zooniverse projects using text analytics and identifying the predominant research area.
New paper on Research Ethics in Citizen Science
A new chapter by Lisa M. Rasmussen on Research Ethics in Citizen Science has been published in the Oxford Handbook of Research. This chapter outlines some of the main ethical issues in citizen science research, which the author describes as a new research approach...
Making sense of the COVID-19 pandemic: An analysis of the dynamics of citizen sense-making practices across Europe
The aim of this report produced by the RETHINK Project is to explore how European citizens make sense of the COVID-19 pandemic. In order to do so, the project team conducted 81 in-depth interviews with citizens, during the first wave of the pandemic. You can access...
The Science of Citizen Science – new book published by COST Action
The eagerly awaited publication "The Science of Citizen Science" is now available as as open access publication from Springer. Over 100 authors contributed to this book, including Julia Lorke and Yaela Golumbic from the CS Track project team. "This book is a wonderful...
Evolution of academic publications in citizen science
Citizen Science incorporates the general public into scientific research and therefore we might expect it not to have a presence in academic publications. This report analyzes the evolution of scientific publications in Citizen Science.
URJC presents eMagazine Community Platform at CCS’20 conference
The Citizen Social Science & Complex Systems Science Workshop is a Satellite Workshop within the Conference on Complex Systems 2020 that the Complex Systems Society organises every year. This year the workshop took place online on 9 December. The URJC team led by...
CitSciVirtual throughout May 2021
Citizen.Science.org have launched an exciting new online event for the Citizen Science community called CitSciVirtual which will run throughout May 2021. Under the banner CitSciVirtual: Local, Global, Connected the organisers say that they are 'taking the best...
New report from JRC on Scaling up Citizen Science
This report entitled Scaling up Citizen Science. What are the factors associated with increased reach and how to lever them to achieve impact is based on a theoretically grounded framework which aims to unbundle the meaning of scaling and spreading in Citizen...
URJC Promotes a better understanding of Citizen Science during Madrid Science and Innovation Week
CS Track partner URJC led a virtual session on 5 November as part of the XX edition of the Madrid Science and Innovation Week. The idea behind this session was to foster a better understanding of citizen science and what participation in citizen science projects...
Let’s talk about money – Citizen science and financial sustainability – free webinar on 19 November
The ACTION project is hosting an online event dedicated to CS financial sustainability on 19 November from 10:00 to 12:00 CET. This webinar includes talks with experts and success cases and provides an opportunity to discuss different sustainability options. The event...
Call for papers on Citizen Science in Higher Education
The Citizen Science: Theory and Practice journal is planning to publish a special collection on Citizen Science in Higher Education. Citizen Science: Theory and Practice is an open-access, peer-reviewed journal providing a central space for cross-disciplinary...
Getting input on the the CS Track database
CS Track partner UPF are leading on the work to create a comprehensive database of projects that will help the team explore citizen science activities. To date this data collection includes data on over 12,000 projects and continues to expand. On 2/11, Patricia Santos...
3rd Annual Citizen Engagement and Deliberative Democracy Festival 6-12 December
The Citizen Engagement and Deliberative Democracy Festival is an annual event organised by the European Commission's Joint Research Centre in the framework of the EU Community of Practice on Citizen Engagement. This year, the 3rd edition of the Citizen Engagement and...
Hybrid and hopeful, this week’s SDGs and Citizen Science conference in Berlin
81 presentations, 50 e-posters, 18 sessions, 5 plenary talks, 2 panel discussions, 1 evening event - that's what made up the Knowledge for Change: A decade of Citizen Science (2020-2030) Conference in support of the SDGs conference in Berlin this week. All this along...
Report on CS by Rand reflects the importance of cultures and institutions
This report entitled Community Citizen Science - from promise to action by Rand used findings from disaster response and recovery case studies to identify specific considerations for community citizen science implementation and impacts. Based on 4 key research...
Meet CS Track at the SDG Citizen Science conference Berlin on 14-15 October
In the CS Track project team, we are delighted to be taking part in the important Knowledge for Change: A decade of Citizen Science (2020-2030) in support of the SDGs Conference on 14 -15 October 2020. This will be a hybrid conference and is an official event of...
New release of EU-Citizen.Science Platform offers lots of additional features
One of the highlights of the ECSA Conference this week was the launch of a bunch of new features in EU-Citizen.Science platform which were launched during an online lunch meeting on Wednesday 9 September. The purpose of these new features is to foster collaboration...
Plans for creating a Community Platform for CS Track take shape
The technical specifications for the CS Track Community Platform were recently finalised in Deliverable 5.1 Technical Specification of the Community Platform. The work was carried out by a team of CS Track researchers led by Manuel Gértrudix from URJC. This...
JYU brings CS Track to Bioeconomy workshop in Finland
The CS Track team at JYU are presenting their work in CS Track during a workshop about citizen science on 14 September linked to forest bioeconomy in Northern Karelia, an area in Eastern Finland. During their presentation, they will describe what Citizen Science can...
One-in-ten U.S. adults say they have taken part in citizen science activity in past year
According to a study carried out recently by the Pew Research Center in the US, one out of 10 adults say they have taken part in an activity classified as citizen science in the past year, and a whopping 26% say that they have taken part in at least one such activity...
Web-based analytics methods and tools surveyed and specified for CS Track
A team of CS Track researchers led by Ulrich Hoppe from RIAS have finalised one of the first public deliverables of the project, the Specification of Web-based Analytics Methods and Tools (D3.1). In this deliverable, they describe the CS Track approach in terms of the...
Let’s talk about Citizen Science….
Michael Strähle & Christine Urban / Wissenschaftsladen Wien - Science Shop Vienna are giving a presentation related to their work in CS Track at the 2020 edition of the EASST/4S conference. The title of this fully online conference is "Locating and Timing Matters:...
EC Report summarises the impact of Citizen Science projects
The recently published report Citizen Science and Citizen Engagement - Achievements in Horizon 2020 and recommendations on the way forward provides an excellent snapshot of European Commission funded efforts in the area of Citizen Science. Written by Colombe Warin and...
Launch of REINFORCE web platform to stimulate community engagement
The REINFORCE project (Research Infrastructures FOR Citizens in Europe), supported by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 SWAFS programme, has launched its new fully-developed website. This platform offers a user-friendly browsing experience for the project’s target...
Lets talk about learning and education in Citizen Science
The recording and other materials generated by the recent webinar initiated by members of the ECSA working group on “Learning and Education in Citizen Science” and the Citizen Science COST Action are now available here. Facilitated by the EU-Citizen.Science project,...
Ecology tops the list of scientific fields in Citizen Science according to preliminary study in Australia
Dr. Yaela Golumbic has published initial results of the study that she is leading into citizen science in Australia. Her first results shows ecology to be the clear leader in terms of the scientific areas addressed. This research highlights the unique characteristics...
WeObserve project launches Open Data Challenge
The ultimate goal of the WeObserve Challenge is to find new approaches and solutions to respond to environmental challenges through open citizen-science datasets, as well as to produce applications and services and showcase citizen science data for public benefit. The...
Characteristics of Citizen Science webinar on 27 May
ECSA and EU-Citizen.Science are co-hosting a webinar about the recently published ‘Characteristics of citizen science’. This document is the output of a community-based effort to outline what can be characterized as citizen science. Led by members of...
Conference on Citizen Science decade in support of SDG
As part of the German EU Council Presidency, the Museum for Naturkunde in Berlin will host a conference on Citizen Science and the Sustainable Development Goals in autumn. The conference, entitled A citizen science decade (2020-2030) in support to the Sustainable...
Hard work these online meetings!
At certain moments during our two and a half day CS Track partner meeting held online from 4-6 May, we were 25 people from all over Europe discussing the progress of the project --- and it was hard work! but we made it and managed to cover an in-depth programme of...
What exactly is Citizen Science?
ECSA and EU.citizen-science have launched the “ECSA Characteristics of Citizen Science” – a foundation document to define the parameters of activities that can be called Citizen Science. This document aimed at providing some set criteria for citizen science, whose...
Citizen Science and Sustainability Transitions
A recently published paper on Science Direct discusses how citizen science can help addressing Sustainability Transitions (STs). The authors propose three pathways through which citizen science could support STs, based on the premise that any transition is...
EU vs Virus Hackathon
Between April 24 and 26, the European Commission hosted a pan-European hackathon to collectively address 20 imminent coronavirus challenges. The objective was to connect civil society, innovatiors, partners and investors across Europe to develop innovative solutions...
GRECO launches the Generation Solar app
The web-version of the citizen science Generation Solar app has just been launched. The GRECO project has developed this tool to research innovative photovoltaic solutions using open science and citizen science. We invite everyone to explore Generation Solar to be...
PLOS ONE moderates a dialogue on citizen science methodologies
On April 2, PLOS ONE moderated a Twitter chat on citizen science (CS) methodologies. The dialogue brought together CS practitioners and stakeholders to cover questions on the standardisation of CS projects, the quality of data submitted by citizen scientists,...
Evaluating the ability of citizen scientists to identify bumblebee species
In a paper published in PLOS ONE, professionals in the field of agroecology stress that bee monitoring projects have growing popularity throughout the world, especially among citizen scientists. Although the authors of the paper acknowledge citizen science data as...
EU-Citizen.Science Platform launched
The new EU-Citizen.Science digital platform for anyone interested in citizen science has just been launched. It gathers best practice resources from the community for initiating, planning and executing citizen science projects, and showcases a wide range of citizen...
Citizens play Foldit to advance research on COVID-19 antiviral therapy
Researchers from the Institute for Protein Design at the University of Washington are calling on citizen scientists to play Foldit – a free online game where players can design and identify proteins that might neutralize SARS-CoV-2 spike protein. Read this recent...
The Odour Observatory challenges the impact measurement of Citizen Science approaches
In a recent blog post, the Odour Observatory challenges the impact measurement of citizen science approaches. In this post, the authors argue that while independent reports advocate for the many benefits of citizen-lead approaches, there is a need to reassess the data...
Last interview in EU.Citizen-Science series highlights value for minority groups
The final interview in the EU-Citizen.Science series about inclusion is with Shara Fisler from the Ocean Discovery Institute in the US. In this interview, Shara explains the approach her institute takes in engaging diverse community groups and presents the model that...
ECSA Conference postponed to 6-9 September
The European conference for citizen and participatory science 2020 (ECSA) which was to have taken place in Trieste, Italy has been postponed to 6-9 September, the conference will still take place in Trieste. You can find out more here.
CitSci2021 Conference, Phoenix, Arizona, USA 25-29 May 2021
The biennial CitSci conference brings attention to cutting-edge and evidence-based practices from many contexts, and connects people from across those contexts to highlight areas of innovation, share ideas and insights, and forge stronger relationships and practices...
ECSITE Conference 2020, Ljubliana, Slovakia 11 – 13 June 2020
The 2020 Ecsite Conference, hosted by the Kersnikova Institute will take place in Ljubljana, Slovenia, from 11-13 June 2020. The conference programme includes three days of conference sessions, two days of pre-conference workshops and a busy networking and social...
ECSA Conference 2020, Trieste, Italy 24-26 May 2020
The annual European conference for citizen and participatory science takes place in Trieste, Italy from 24 to 26 May. Entitled ‘Encounters in Citizen Science”this event will focus on junctures in science: between scientists and citizens; between East and West; between...
First announcement of CS Track to European Citizen Science community
As part of our collaboration with other European Citizen Science projects, we were delighted to be included in the most recent newsletter distributed by the EU-Citizen.Science project team. These newsletters are circulated every 4 months and provide projects with an...
Invitation to join survey into defining citizen science
EU-Citizen.Science and the European Citizen Science Association are trying to develop a short briefing that can be used by research funders, policy bodies, and scientists, to decide which activities, and under which conditions, should be considered to be citizen...
Cluster meeting for European funded citizen science projects in Brussels
Our project coordinators Raul Drachman and Reuma De Groot were delighted to take part in the Citizen Science Cluster Workshop which took place on 12 December in Brussels. Along with representatives from 16 other citizen science projects, they discussed how citizen...
CS Track gets off to a bright start in Leuven
The CS Track team finally got the chance to meet one another face-to-face to work on project planning in Leuven on 9-10 December 2019. This meeting was hosted by partner ATiT in Martin’s Klooster in Leuven and turned out to be quite an intensive meeting. It included...