✍️Science Writing News Roundup #9 (October 3, 2020)
Apply now for the AAAS Mass Media Fellowship + #BlackInSciCommWeek is October 4-10 + Video: Principles of Science Writing + The holy grails of chemistry
In 1995, researchers laid out 8 topics that they believed represented the most ground-breaking challenges in chemistry. Chemistry World has been taking a look at how the field has changed over the last 25 years and where it might be going next. Check out “The holy grails of chemistry.” Thanks to Chemistry World for supporting the Science Writing News Roundup!
🚀 Opportunities
Are you a science student or postdoc in the US interested in science communication and journalism? You can try science journalism out in a newsroom next summer as an AAAS Mass Media Fellow. Applications are now open for 2021.
Future Human, a new publication from the OneZero team at Medium, is interested in deeply reported, narrative-driven stories about biotech, climate science, food/ag science that are changing the outlook for humankind. If you've got a pitch that fits the bill, send an email to yasmin@medium.com
#BlackInSciCommWeek is October 4-10 and the SciTalk blog is getting ready to publish some great interviews with Black science communicators. You can pitch relevant stories by emailing blog@sciencetalk.org
SEI Asia opens call for environmental reporting grants for local journalists. Each grantee will receive $2,000.
Call for proposals: global health grants. The Solutions Journalism Network is offering financial support for U.S. newsrooms to write about responses to the pandemic from outside the U.S.
Discover Magazine updated their pitch guidelines for freelance writers, learn what makes a story a good fit for Discover.
🍄 Resources
Science writer Meenakshi Prabhune is curating the @iamscicomm account on Twitter this week, and she's been sharing advice on effective science writing, and resources for freelance writers.
The Science Comm Hub Nigeria created a database of science journalists in Nigeria to facilitate collaboration with scientists.
[Sponsored] Improve your knowledge of epidemiology with SAFOSO's e-Learning course “Epidemiology for Non-Epidemiologists,” with examples of frequently occurring public health and veterinary diseases.
The Knight Center is offering a free 4-week online course “Digital investigations for journalists: How to follow the digital trail of people and entities.”
🎫 Videos
“Science Journalism During a Pandemic and Beyond.” For the 75th anniversary of the AAAS Kavli awards, Carl Zimmer, Maggie Koerth, Angela Saini and Azeen Ghorayshi discuss science reporting in difficult times.
Natalie Wolchover, senior writer and editor for Quanta Magazine, gives a keynote address “Principles of Science Writing” at ComSciCon-San Diego, an annual workshop on communicating science.
“Science and Journalism – Communicating about Coronavirus and Climate Change,” a discussion with Brian O'Donovan, Dr. Rita Colwell, Andrew Revkin.
"Wandering My Way into Canadian Science Communication: Lessons Learned and Ideas on Where to Start" — ComSciCon-GTA keynote address with Dr. Cylita Guy.
George Zaidan, a science communicator, television and web host, and MIT-trained chemist, talks with SWINY co-chair David Levine about his new book, Ingredients: The Strange Chemistry of What We Put in Us and on Us.
🔭 Ideas
Four data journalists discuss the biggest challenges in designing visualizations related to the COVID-19 pandemic, and their approach to producing graphics that are accurate, informative, and actionable.
The Job Talk blog recently interviewed Jonathan Wosen, a biotech reporter at The San Diego Union-Tribune, who transitioned from research to science journalism. “Whatever career you pursue, you’ll be infinitely happier if you enjoy the day-to-day minutiae. The amount of time you spend celebrating completing a project (in my case, a story) will always be dwarfed by the amount of time it took you to complete it,” says Wosen.
Russia’s Sputnik vaccine campaign undermines science and journalism, and the effects may be long-lasting, Olga Dobrovidova writes in an op-ed for Undark.
The Chronicles of CRISPR. GEN’s editor-in-chief, John Sterling, interviewed Kevin Davies, the author of a new book Editing Humanity: The CRISPR Revolution and the New Era of Genome Editing, about his motivation and objectives in writing the book.
🌍 News
US science news biased against people with names of non-British origin. Hao Peng at the University of Michigan and his colleagues found that the first authors of papers who had names that weren't of British origin were significantly less likely to be mentioned or quoted. (https://arxiv.org/abs/2009.01896)
Neuroscientist Theanne Griffith created a series of science-themed chapter books for young readers, called “The Magnificent Makers,” to show that “science is for everyone, no matter where kids are from or what they look like or what their ethnic background or socioeconomic standing might be.”
France is calling for a "science and media network" to promote reliable science, but critics worry about journalistic independence. Whatever initiative is put in place to reduce the gap between scientific consensus and public opinion, it “can only work in partnership with science journalists,” says Virginie Tournay, an innovation sociologist at SciencePo Paris.
Congratulations to the finalists in the 2020 Australian Museum Eureka Prizes! Learn more about their work by clicking on “Finkel Foundation Eureka Prize for Long-Form Science Journalism” and “Australian Museum Eureka Prize for Science Journalism.”
✍️ Events
‘Careers in Science Journalism with ABSW’ at #SPANC20, with Matt Warren, Dalmeet Singh and Cathleen O’Grady (October 3, 2020)
#BlackInSciCommWeek: A week of workshops, panels, talks and fun events, dedicated to building and uplifting Black science communicators. Check out the schedule, there is a panel on science writing (October 4-10, 2020)
Introductory Storytelling Workshop with The Story Collider (October 5, 2020)
#FancyScienceShared will unite scicommers, journalists, scientists, writers, and others interested in science (October 5-12, 2020)
Reporting on the pandemic will offer science writers and the public an analysis of COVID-19 coverage thus far (October 7, 2020)
Webinar "SciComm advocacy: Writing an op-ed or letter to the editor" (October 8, 2020)
Kavli Conversations on Science Communication: Watching Them Watching Us: Reporting on Surveillance Capitalism (October 8, 2020) + Writing About Weird Biology for More than Just Laughs (October 29, 2020)
The Society of Freelance Journalists announced their next Q&A event. It'll take place in their Slack group, in the #general channel on October 8, 2020, and will be all about career planning and development as a freelance journalist.
Deconstructing pandemic news, with award-winning science journalist Ed Yong (October 13, 2020)
ABSW 2020 Awards Ceremony: A free online event celebrating excellence in science writing (October 14, 2020), part of the UK Conference of Science Journalists (October 13-15, 2020)
NEA Big Read Writing Workshop: Storytelling techniques in nature and science writing with Amy Stewart (October 17, 2020)
ScienceWriters2020, a joint meeting of the National Association of Science Writers and the Council for the Advancement of Science Writing (October 19-23, 2020)
The Art of the Interview with Frank Sesno – a conversation about asking the right questions at the right time (DC Science Writers Association, October 29, 2020)
Learn the many ways that Google Tools can make your stories stronger. Learn how to build interactive charts, maps, visualizations, and more (October 29, 2020)
🖊️ Internships and jobs
Science Reporter, Inverse, Remote
Staff Writer, Gizmodo (Science), New York, NY
Summer Writing Intern, Quanta Magazine, New York City, NY
Spring Writing Intern, Quanta Magazine, New York City, NY
Science Engagement & Communications Intern, Bayer Crop Science, Chesterfield, MO
Features Editor, Physics World, Bristol, UK
Associate Science Writer, MIT Lincoln Laboratory, Lexington, MA
Staff Writer, Earther, Gizmodo, New York, NY
Senior Media Officer, The Institute of Cancer Research, London, UK
Associate News Editor/Science Writer, University of Massachusetts Amherst, MA
Technical Writer, National Institutes of Health, Montgomery County, MD
News Writer Intern, Science Magazine, Washington, DC
Senior Staff Editor, Health & Science (Opinion), the New York Times, NY
Sr Science Marketing Writer, Illumina, San Diego, CA
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