Author Archives: Dave Poulson

Gender and food

Here’s a look at how researchers are examining the impact of gender on food systems and food systems reform.
It was produced by Michigan State University students affiliated with the Knight Center for Environmental Journalism.
https://youtu.be/LMgixuGWyv8

Knight Center faculty publish steel photography research

Smoke Series, Bethlehem #16, Lackawanna NY 1988:” Image copyright John Pfahl

Environmental impacts of steelmaking are felt in communities where steel is made and beyond, from dramatic changes in landscapes to smoke-darkened horizons to contaminated ponds.
For photographers and other artists—painters, poets, songwriters—those impacts provide an opportunity to use their creative works to draw public attention to ecological conditions at operating and abandoned mills.
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Tipping toward better science communication

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6UROOe4RrU&feature=youtu.be
By David Poulson
Michigan State University alum Sunshine Menezes speaks here about the tipping points of turning scientists into great communicators and journalists into skillful science interpreters.
She is the executive director of the Metcalf Institute for Marine and Environmental Reporting at the University of Rhode Island Graduate School of Oceanography.
This video integrates her talk and power point presentation at the 2015 “Fate of the Earth” conference put on by MSU’s Environmental Science and Policy Program in East Lansing, Michigan.

Science, Seuss and the Elements of Style

By David Poulson
Most of my communications work with scientists and other researchers involves convincing them to write shorter, less jargon-filled sentences.
The payoff is improved public understanding that can build a constituency for what they do.
But now there is evidence of another payoff – one that is more direct, measurable and involves the coin of their realm: academic citations.
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