We are pleased to announce the Summer 2018 issue of Science Education and Civic Engagement: An International Journal.
Highlighting the value of international service, Courtney Cox, Sarah Lenahan, Patricia Devine, and Panagiotis Linos (Butler College) describe collaboration among the College of Pharmacy and Health Science, the College of Liberal Arts and Science, and Barnabas Task, a non-profit organization. Students have the opportunity to travel to the Dominican Republic to participate in service activities with medical and dental professionals. They work with community leaders to convey public health information on topics such as nutrition, exercise, smoking cessation, and mosquito-borne illnesses, so that the knowledge can be disseminated throughout the community using local networks. This experience enables students to develop their cultural awareness and illustrates the importance of local knowledge and collaboration in promoting social change.
Susan Huss-Lederman, Prajukti Bhattacharyya, and Brianna Deering (University of Wisconsin-Whitewater) describe their participation in the Do Now U Project, a collaboration between the National Center for Science and Civic Engagement and KQED Public Media. The project paired two courses, Environmental Geology and College Writing in English as a Second Language, and required students to write blog posts on environmental topics. After all the posts had been read and analyzed, one was chosen for publication on the web. This project provides students with valuable opportunities to research open-ended questions with important social impact while learning to collaborate and to communicate effectively.
Ellen Mappen (National Center for Science and Civic Engagement) provides an interesting case history of the beginnings of the SENCER-ISE project, which is a structured collaboration between SENCER and practitioners of informal science education (ISE) based on issues of civic engagement. This account describes the mutually beneficial synergies between formal and informal education and includes evaluation results that demonstrate the effectiveness of project partnerships.
The issue concludes with an insightful review by Katayoun Chamany (Eugene Lang College, New School) of a report from The National Academies entitled “Integration of the Humanities and Arts with Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine: Branches from the Same Tree.” The review situates this new report in a historical context and examines how the integration of disciplinary perspectives from the arts and humanities can enhance science education and motivate students to persist in their scientific studies. We wish to thank all the authors for sharing their accomplishments with the readers of this journal.
– Matt Fisher and Trace Jordan
Co-Editors-in-Chief
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