I enjoy bringing science to the public.  Not only do I feel a sense of duty to do so, but this always reminds me that what we do is exciting.  I regularly judge local and regional science fairs where the creativity of young scientists has amazed me.  Working with elementary educators, I designed an activity called “CSI Intertidal” where students investigate intertidal crime scenes to identify criminal suspects.  CSI Intertidal was successful at marine lab open houses (MDIBL and Northeastern’s Marine Science Center) and we’re hoping to modify it for the classroom.

In addition to bringing science to the public, I involve the public in my own experiments – often with the help of elementary and marine educators.  I am currently designing a monitoring project that will rely heavily on citizen scientists.  Recently, I helped run a bioblitz for Boston Harbor Islands National Park Area.  This event brought together scientists and citizens to compare the diversity of invertebrates and seaweeds on different island habitats.  These data will help us as we proceed with our monitoring project.  Citizen scientists provide needed support and they collect data that can be as high quality as our own data.

Building upon inspiration provided by Randy Olson, of “Barnacles Tell No Lies” fame, I have started creating music videos that bring science to a broader audience. Two of my recent videos are “What Invert?” and “Inducible Defense Rapinar.”