Outreach Assessment Report Available
International Polar Year
The full report can be downloaded at:
http://apecs.is/images/stories/files/ICSU_IPY_EOC_Report_2011.pdf
One year after the launch of the International Polar Year (IPY)
Education, Outreach, and Communication (EOC) Assessment Project, the
task of inventorying and investigating the hundreds of IPY EOC programs
that occurred during IPY 2007-08 is now complete.
Supported by the Association of Polar Early Career Scientists (APECS),
the International Arctic Science Committee (IASC), and the Scientific
Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR), this International Council for
Science (ICSU) funded project is the only global examination of what
happened in outreach during IPY. The latest IPY event was one of the
most ambitious polar research programs to date, and tens of thousands of
scientists and students participated, but IPY also set out to involve
members of the general public in active polar science endeavors on a
global scale. The IPY EOC Assessment Project was intended to measure the
success of this part of the IPY plan.
With over 550 IPY EOC activities, from more than 70 countries in 25
languages, IPY EOC is one of the largest global investments in science
outreach to date. The IPY EOC Assessment brought together educators,
communications personnel, and researchers. The resulting report examines
the success of IPY EOC efforts and discusses why IPY EOC was able to
reach its goals and beyond. From the experience of IPY, the report also
outlines a set of lessons learned on how to improve science outreach
across a variety of disciplines. These lessons will be useful for other
science outreach projects--large or small; regional, national, or
international.
IPY EOC went to new heights, depths, and extremes to take people to the
poles and to take the poles to the people. Now the legacy of IPY
outreach is helping to shape the future of science education and
outreach. Read the report or search the online Polar Outreach Catalogue
(http://apecs.is/education-outreach/catalogue), a growing inventory of
IPY projects and new outreach efforts to help educate the world about
the global importance of the polar regions.
The full report can be downloaded at:
http://apecs.is/images/stories/files/ICSU_IPY_EOC_Report_2011.pdf.