Wow, team URI, this is an incredible learning effort. Mobilizing something of this scale must have been quite an effort. How are you identifying outcomes for the learners receiving the programs from the life-feed?

Thank you for your comments and your question, Johnny. This was indeed an amazing multi-disciplinary effort. There were multiple moving parts from planning a full-scale oceanographic research expedition; recruiting, preparing, and engaging a cohort of student participants; designing the technology to broadcast from such high northern latitudes; broadcasting live into museums; and producing a high definition two-hour documentary - all while at sea in the Arctic! Our evaluation team conducted a national baseline study (n=960, mirroring the latest U.S. Census demographic) to determine public understanding of and interest in the changing Arctic region. This greatly helped us In tailoring the public, interactive broadcasts. The evaluation team then conducted exit surveys of the museum visitors and produced a report to help us identify learning outcomes. The evaluators were also able to give us feedback as the broadcasts were occurring, which allowed us to improve them over the course of the expedition. 

Hi Perrin! Thank you for the compliment. Our interactive broadcasts took a lot of coordination between us and the venue facilitators (Alaska Sea Life Center, Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, and Exploratorium). Their ability to promote the programs and physically bring audiences into the room to view the live feeds was so important. What really put the cherry on top was our ability to also receive a return feed on the ship. This allowed us to watch the live program as it was playing. We were able to reference visuals as the audience was seeing them. It also allowed us to look directly at our audiences. Our host and cohosts were able to call on specific individuals and converse with them "face-to-face". This seemed to really surprise and engage our audiences. As you said, it helped them realize they were not just passive viewers, but active participants. We also found it valuable to start the show by engaging the audience in a cheer, followed by a few of their own questions. This initial interactivity starting the show inspired positive energy from the viewers, and encouraged them to interact later on during the Q/A session.

Thank you Perrin for your comments and kind words! To build off what Jessica has included above, as the lead broadcast host for all of the NPP interactions, I just wanted to reinforce the idea of engaging the audience early and often. Kicking things off with an enthusiastic hello, and soliciting a response from the audience was important to do BEFORE significant content delivery began. And then we tried to integrate audience questions throughout the intro and immediately after we came back to camera from pre-produced packages that summarized the science themes for the onboard research.  We really wanted to keep things as conversational as possible between the hosts/co-hosts, and then the ship-based team and shore-based audiences. I think we achieved that during our broadcasts, and that helped make them the success that they were.

Hi Perrin.  It would be great to chat with you further about things. Let's connect outside of the Showcase and set up a time to talk about the above!

Hi Sara. Very glad to hear you liked the video! I definitely have a lot of fun stories from the 18 day expedition but I think the most fun was being able to play ping pong (or table tennis) in one of the supply rooms. Being able to play a few games with friends after a hard day of research was always so much fun. And yes! In the couple livestreams I was in I talked about playing ping pong and how fun it was! 

Many thanks for watching our video, Sara! There were honestly many fun and memorable experiences from the expedition- it truly was an amazing and unique experience to share with such a motivated, intelligent group of students! And yes, we did weave these experiences into our broadcasts, as so many things unfolded in real time, either right before, during, or after an interaction.

As Expedition Coordinator, there were many memories I have from our journey, that I will honestly keep with me forever. After our full first full day of broadcasts (six interactions in one day, 3 in the morning, 3 in the afternoon, with a quick break for lunch in between), our team was the last group to have the opportunity to visit Beechy Island, where Franklin’s expedition was known to overwinter, and a few of his crew and other folks are buried. The ship held the last helicopter ride for our broadcast team. The weather had been cloudy and cold, all day, but when we flew, the clouds cleared and we had clear skies to see the surrounding, beautiful, Arctic landscape. Then, just outside the island, we noticed a huge pod of beluga whales swimming in the waters just off of Beechy Island- hundreds could be seen in the waters below the helicopter.  It was amazing.  And, as a marine mammal biologist by training, it truly was a special moment for myself (I had to flip my headset microphone up, so that I wouldn’t scream and deafen the pilot and everyone else in the helicopter). Walking along Beechy Island was a surreal experience in itself- so quiet, so stark, yet so beautiful. Sharing that experience with students, and then hearing from historical experts, as well as having our Inuit youth share their perspective on what those grounds meant to them and their communities, only elevated the opportunity. After a successful day of broadcasts, it really was the perfect way to round out that day and something we all talked about during the next day's broadcasts. For one of our students, the Beechy Island visit was a significant experience he highlighted again during our final broadcast of the expedition.  The beluga whale footage and other video taken during this off-ship visit (as well as other experiences during the expedition) was integrated into highlight videos posted to the NPP website (https://northwestpassageproject.org/), integrated as "B-roll" background footage in the broadcasts, reflected upon in student blog posts (also on the website), and then also used in social media posts throughout the expedition.

Hi Sara! This was certainly a fun way, for all involved, to share the expedition. Our museum and science center partners (Alaska SeaLife Center, Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, and the Exploratorium) played a major role in recruiting audiences for the live interactions at their venue. Calendar events, postings/signage in the venues, and social media posts brought hundreds of visitors in for the interactions.  

Social media really played a large role in engaging the public whether through advertising museum and science center live interactions, with the Facebook Live events we hosted, as well as posting updates from the expedition. The Inner Space Center social media platforms were the primary way of sharing information leading up to, throughout, and following the expedition. 

This is great, thank you all for your responses. What a great way to experience science, especially now since we're all staying home!

Hi Craig. It is great to hear from you, and thank you for your comments and questions. 1.) We built a relationship with our five MSI partners through a designated faculty liaison. The five faculty liaisons worked together to offer expanded Arctic-related content in their courses (and at three institutions a new undergraduate course) focused on our project's scientific messages. These courses were used to engage students and helped us to build relationships with the students. We then engaged the students through a seven-part online series to introduce the project, the research themes, and further Arctic science content. These virtual interactions, helped the students to get to know each other, as well as our team members. The students came together for a face-to-face orientation before heading to Greenland where they embarked on the Oden. During the expedition, there was plenty of time for bonding and further engagement. Following the expedition, we have planned on-campus screening events at each MSI of the project's documentary, Frozen Obsession, to be followed by panel discussions with the students and research and film teams. We will also be holding a culminating workshop with the all the participants. In addition to all these activities, the students worked with the science teams to present the results of their experiences at the 2020 Ocean Sciences Meeting in San Diego. 2.) We had two Inuit representatives as active participants in the project and expedition, one of which has served as our liaison to the Eastern Arctic Inuit communities. Our community liaison paved the way for our participants to visit communities that don't traditionally have visitors. We also had a contingent of community members visit the Oden while it was anchored offshore. Our Inuit participants were able to sensitize our other participants to current Inuit concerns and priorities by sharing stories of the Inuit ways of life, their cultrual history, and their traditional ecological knowledge. This was truly a blessing for all the participants, as well as the project. The Inuit perspective has also been included in the documentary.

Hi Craig.  To add to Gail's comments, we felt it was important for the students and scientists to visit and engage with a local Inuit community and to involve some Inuit students in our expedition. After all, we were conducting research in their "Nunavut" territory of Canada. We recruited young professional Inuit participants with the help of an educator involved with Ikaarvik, which creates opportunities for Inuit youth to work on research projects.  https://ocean.org/our-work/arctic-connections/i...  One of our Inuit participants, Mia Otokiak reminded me that Inuit are the original Arctic researchers, and have been there for over 1,000 years.

Especially for the documentary I wanted to put a human face on the changes being experienced in the Arctic and the Inuit are on the front line.  In addition to documenting the science program and student experiences I wanted to include the humanistic perspective of climate change.  Our visit to an Inuit community and interactions there, and having two Inuit participants on the expedition really helped expand everyone's understanding of their culture and their concerns as they confront a changing climate.  We all benefited from this.

Hi Leigh: Thank you for your comments and question. One of our project goals has been to help the museum and science center visitors that participated in the live broadcasts understand that what is happening in the Arctic affects all people around the globe. Our on camera experts did make the connection between climatic warming, melting terrestrial ice, and SLR. They also discussed why it is so important to study the changing Arctic, making it relevant to their own daily lives.

Hi Leigh:  Indeed, thank you for these kudos and questions.   While we were aboard, we experienced very warm conditions, many degrees above the seasonal average for that time of year. Our visit also coincided with of brushfires on Greenland.  There were so many indicators of unseasonable warmth and drought.   This really drew a stark contrast with students and expeditioner's anticipation and it was a great way for us to emphasize Arctic Amplification - and communicate how the Arctic is like a canary in the climate change coal mine.  

Really interesting stuff, Brice. Thank you. I wished we'd been tuned in. The Gulf of Maine (our home turf) is obviously being hugely impacted by the warming. That's at the heart of the story kids experience in our informal experience. We'll look at what more we can do to make these connections to the Arctic.

Hi James, love the connections you made. Gail did an excellent job summarizing the challenges of satellite connectivity and the technology we use. I’d like to add to what Gail said and elaborate on our equipment. Marshall cameras were placed all over the ship to provide live feeds of the deck, helipad, and general ship activity. Then our Sony video cameras were used for the broadcasts. I used a DLSR to collect the footage used for B-roll. Our mobile telepresence units (MTUs) are basically a full production facility in a box. A Blackmagic ATEM switcher gave us control over choosing which of the multiple camera feeds we could send to the facility. We have audio mixers for the host microphones, RTS comms rack and belt packs for the on shore director, host, satellite technician and myself (field technician) to communicate during the show. Our director, Alex, could request different cameras, actions, or responses from us in real time. This definitely increased the complexity, but it was crucial to running a smooth and exciting broadcast. Another important piece to help pull off this project was backups. We had back up cameras, mics (wireless and wired), audio mixers, laptops, cabling, even a variety of video conferencing software… this list goes on and on. This was so helpful because we did run into hiccups and equipment malfunctions, but our preparedness allowed us to quickly replace the equipment or change the direction of the show to operate around any errors, while maintaining a relatively seamless program for the audience. We also had our in house studio set up with hosts ready to go incase we lost satellite signal. Each project we do is different, but our ability to creatively solve problems led the effort of connection and accessibility.

In total we reached approximately 1000 individuals at institutions, and almost 5000 viewers through our Facebook lives.

Great question Ivory. I’ve worked on projects with varying aspects of connection and sometimes very specific communication goals for a little over 10 years with the Inner Space Center. Plenty of which had elements that worked well but of course non are “perfect.” Although perfection is always an elusive goal!

In short what doesn’t work is a presentation of pure facts or knowledge. We have found audiences want and thrive in informal settings (even remotely), immediately responsive communications and tying information to personal experiences or stories so the intended message can resonate within the audience. Then the information becomes more relevant for the audience and they now can more easily associate within their own personal experiences.

We use strategies of documentary and narrative storytelling and science communicaiton methods which we learn from amazing groups around the area. One being the Metcalf Institute. We also intentionally deliver information in categories with varying degrees of of place, storytelling, and emotion to provide at least three points of entry for someone in the audience at hand.

We want to spend less time convincing and more time connecting with audiences.

Thanks for a great question!

- alex

Many thanks for your comment and question, Nicole! Science communication was a key component of the expedition, in the form of not only the interactive broadcasts, but also the blog posts that students were posting to the Northwest Passage Project website. The students did receive some training on best practices with regards to writing blogs, posting to social media, and then how the broadcasts would work, their co-host roles, etc. However, the best training (I feel) came through the actual process of writing the blog posts and conducting the interactive broadcasts. Myself, and other team members, would review blog posts before they were posted, provide comments and iterate with the students when necessary. In a similar fashion, feedback was also provided after each broadcast, so that students could learn, grow, and gain confidence in their roles as co-hosts. Many of the students were also integral members of our field production team, helping with the cameras, lights, reflectors, and more. Thus, they were exposed to the full production process, which was another valuable science communication experience.

Thanks Nicole and well said Holly! I just want to add when scientists - whether early, mid or late career - engage in live and interactive communication activities their skill set of being able to effectively communicate their work is growing and refining in that very action. We on shore also discuss feedback and notes each day with the at sea team. Adapting as we go and working with unpredictable scenarios in the field. Also, live programs present unique opportunities to gather real time feedback from your audience. It is a highly adaptable and flexible approach that rewards a proper plan and a creative team. In the end this benefits the audience you’ve somehow garnered to show up!

There is some growing research that points to the lack of instructional training in academics for early scientists that is offered by their higher ed institution. This is changing for sure but the lack of communication training while learning to become a professional scientist leads to issues and unnecessary burdens placed on the scientists involved in the project.

One final point relating to the learning by doing approach - with proper plan and scicomm capacity built beforehand - was also emphasized in the number of programs we conducted. As we say in the video, there were over 50 interactive programs from a rotating group sailing the Northwest Passage to informal science education centers across the U.S. Iterations were constant throughout the 18 day project and really helped hone the skills of the students and ourselves. The feedback from our partner venues was critical as well to meet their audiences, that they see each day, closer to their personal experiences.

Thank you, Alex and Holly, for your thorough responses - much appreciated!

Thanks for the question Michael. For this NSF funded project, there were multiple modes at play from applied science, live and interactive programming, and a feature length documentary. Of course the recruitment and coordination of the student participants was a major part too.  A thread that ran through each aspect of the project was the need to communicate and connect audiences into the important scientific work happening in the Arctic region.

I'm going to have another member of our team follow up to provide more detail and insight.

- alex

For our project, a citizen (neuro)science game, we've taken a few approaches that have been helpful.

1. Small, easily digestible lessons from experts that players can stumble across in the appropriate context (for instance, information about axon characteristics near an instance of such).
2. Expert player-generated guidance comments in-game. Our "power players" can lay down comments along tricky areas to help guide others.
3. Open communication between scientists, community facilitators, and players via in-game chat.
4. "Coopetitions" between scientists and players. Everyone works toward a common goal while competing against one another.

Obviously, some of these are more easily translatable to your context than others. But focusing on that community aspect has been key for us.

Miyoko, yes-- it's definitely a time to learn tips and best practices for online interactions. The biggest take away is to know your audience. We learned a lot from the observations made by our museum and science center partner liaisons. They provided us feedback in real-time about audience retention and engagement that helped us adapt future interactions. One of the biggest comments was to engage the audience early, let them know this is live and an interactive event. Throughout our 25-minute interactions, we asked for questions multiple times (not just at the end) and tried to get a reaction (cheers, etc) to remind them that this was a two-way program. Almost daily check-ins with our partners were key to get this feedback and provide successful interactions. 

Thank you, Meena, for taking the time to view our video and for your kind words! It was a multifaceted project, from shore and at sea, that everyone involved with is very proud of. The enthusiasm and energy of our students was SO special and tangible-- it really helped to power the project to the success that it was. Now, it's equally exciting to see that same enthusiasm maintained, post-expedition, and carry these students forward into future STEM endeavors.

Hi David, thanks for your comments and question. To add to Brice, because of URI's Inner Space Center' "telepresence" capability on the ship via satellite, we were able to transmit video clips to our publicist from the Arctic during the expedition, which then were picked up by Reuters News Service and got global attention. Here are two examples.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-environment-...

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-climate-chan...

I have produced a feature length documentary, "Frozen Obsession" about the expedition that will be broadcast in the coming year and a one-hour version that will be shown at all of the participating colleges where the student participants and scientists will also have a panel discussion after viewing. You are absolutely right that there is an inescapable "emotional connection" when experiencing a place like the Arctic in person. I believe for all of us, not just the students, it was a life changing experience. Documenting the science, the personal experiences of the students and scientists, and stunning beauty of the Arctic will hopefully convey the high stakes consequences of a changing climate and warming Arctic that broad audiences can relate to.

Thanks for watching our video and your comments.  We agree that engaging students in authentic scientific research is important and valuable. Although the expedition wrapped up in August, the student participants are still engaged in data processing and analysis and will continue to do so. As you may have learned in the video, the project encompassed four scientific research areas each with graduate student leads. Many of the undergrads are still working (virtually) within their groups looking at data and have presented on their experiences and initial findings. Although not a formal internship, the students are still engaged, learning new scientific techniques and have the graduate students and scientists as mentors. 

Thank you for your kind comments, Eden. As Andrea mentioned, one of our goals is to keep the undergrads engaged for as long as possible. This is not part of a formal REU program, and we already have an REU at our institution (URI Graduate School of Oceanography). Unquatifiable impacts of the projects include the many unplanned mentoring opportunities that have arisen between project scientists and staff with the students. We have been advising on career pathways, graduate schools, employment opportunities, etc.