{"id":1307,"date":"2018-02-20T10:53:17","date_gmt":"2018-02-20T10:53:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/?p=1307"},"modified":"2018-02-20T10:53:17","modified_gmt":"2018-02-20T10:53:17","slug":"what-the-postgraduate-certificate-in-science-communication-means-to-me","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/what-the-postgraduate-certificate-in-science-communication-means-to-me\/","title":{"rendered":"What the Postgraduate Certificate in Science Communication means to me"},"content":{"rendered":"

I am not a scientist. There, I said it. But I am a science communicator.<\/p>\n

A couple of decades ago, someone like me, with an airy fairy English literature degree, wouldn\u2019t have found themselves working with university scientists. But these days, more and more people like me \u2013 science cheerleaders but not necessarily actual scientists \u2013 are helping communicate research in the real world.<\/p>\n

Science is definitely changing \u2013 even in the last five years since I\u2019ve been working closely with researchers. The Research and Excellence Framework (REF) and funding bodies now demand impact that\u2019s way beyond papers, posters and citations. In this climate, enrolling on UWE\u2019s Postgraduate Certificate in Practical Science Communication<\/a> made total sense to me.<\/p>\n

The fact such a qualification even exists signals that the discipline of science communication is definitely A Thing, and should be taken seriously. Researchers are an increasingly diverse bunch: the days of the don in his (or sometimes her) ivory tower are (mostly) a thing of the past. Scientists are open to communicating their findings with a wider audience beyond other academics \u2013 and we science communicators have a vital part to play in helping them do this well. And if there\u2019s one thing I\u2019ve learned about researchers in the last few years, it\u2019s that they respect academic qualifications.<\/p>\n

Health is my area of expertise, where it\u2019s vital that we get messages from research right. If a physicist discovers something new about the origins of the universe and it gets misreported, that\u2019s frustrating but it\u2019s not exactly life-threatening. But health stories are bread and butter for certain sections of the mainstream media, and scientific nuance can be sacrificed on the altar of clickbait headlines. Obviously I\u2019m not going to change that culture singlehandedly, but if I can help research teams produce accurate copy that\u2019s still accessible and engaging to the person in the street that\u2019s a good start.<\/p>\n

For me, there\u2019s also a political drive at work. In the current climate of fake news and the devaluing \u2018experts\u2019, helping more people understand science is a small but valuable contribution to a better, more informed society.<\/p>\n

And there are also personal gains. I wanted to hone my skills and formalise the knowledge I\u2019ve accumulated from my work. It\u2019s been fascinating to discover that things I do intuitively, like framing a story, have whole bodies of theory behind them. In fact, sometimes this new knowledge has brought a sort of paralysis when writing something that I would normally knock out quickly in my day job. It\u2019s certainly made me take stock and adopt a more analytical approach to what I do at work, though pressures still demand the odd bit of knocking stuff out.<\/p>\n

I spend a lot of time training and supporting other people to be good communicators, so the course has enhanced my confidence in doing this. It\u2019s reinforced the fact that I do already know a lot about effective science communication, and rounded the rough edges off things I\u2019ve picked up informally over the years.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s well known that lifelong learning is an essential element of personal wellbeing. This course has invigorated me, helping me see new perspectives, meet new people and work on out of the ordinary projects. I\u2019ve created a magazine with a group of people I didn\u2019t know six months ago, and developed a board game for a UWE air quality project. It\u2019s been an energising experience.<\/p>\n

I won\u2019t pretend it\u2019s all been easy. I have a family and a full time job, and fitting the course in around these responsibilities has been challenging. I\u2019m lucky that my employers have funded and supported me to do this course and have been generous in allowing me study leave. My partner has taken up the slack and generally been a rock when deadlines bite. I wouldn\u2019t have been able to do the PGCert without the support of colleagues, friends and family.<\/p>\n

Science communication is an alchemical mix of creativity and scholarship, where apparently clashing cultures meet. This course has really brought that to life for me. I\u2019ve enjoyed the journey so far so much that I\u2019m seriously considering doing the full MSc \u2013 if my work and personal life can accommodate it!<\/p>\n

\"\"Zoe Trinder-Widdess is Communications Manager for <\/strong>Bristol Health Partners<\/strong><\/a> and <\/strong>NIHR CLAHRC West<\/strong><\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I am not a scientist. There, I said it. But I am a science communicator. A couple of decades ago, someone like me, with an airy fairy English literature degree, wouldn\u2019t have found themselves working with university scientists. But these days, more and more people like me \u2013 science cheerleaders but not necessarily actual scientists … Continue reading “What the Postgraduate Certificate in Science Communication means to me”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":1308,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wds_primary_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,13,3,4],"tags":[194,197,195,198,196,193],"class_list":["post-1307","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-faculty-of-health-and-applied-sciences","category-pgcert-practical-science-communication","category-science-communication","category-science-communication-unit","tag-bristol-health-partners","tag-health","tag-nihr-clahrc-west","tag-pgcert","tag-postgraduate","tag-zoe-trinder-widdess"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1307","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1307"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1307\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1312,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1307\/revisions\/1312"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1308"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1307"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1307"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/science-communication\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1307"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}