Transcript

KATEY:

My name is Kate Lewthwaite, I am Citizen and Science Programme Manager at The Woodland Trust.

Why citizen science? I’ve always been passionate about reaching out in science to as many people as possible, and helping them engaging with it. So that is my personal, I suppose my mission statement of my whole career, so that is why I am in the job that I’m in, which is my dream job, which is wonderful.

Why is it important? Because science impacts everywhere, every day in every way, and if all of us were a bit more informed and if we engaged more, then we can make better choices as a society about the way forward and what matters to us.

JAKE MORRIS:

From Defra, I lead on social research for Defra plant health and have worked in citizen science projects now support citizen science, specifically as they relate to tree health - and the question around why citizen and science? For me… erm, there tends to be focus on data, and the gathering and management of data, and using citizen scientists to add temporal and spatial resolution to data, I think it is really important, but I think is less important arguably then what I referred to is the sort of social and cultural development aspects and dimension of citizen science. So good citizen science projects, tend to be very successful at generating benefits for groupings of people and for individuals.

So if you think about people going out to the natural environment, experiencing nature, having positive interaction with nature, and then you participate in initiatives that gather data, to inform policy how better to protect the environment. So that confers on those individuals and those groups a whole set of benefits which I think are the real value around citizen science.

MICHAEL POCOCK:

I’m Doctor Michael Pocock, I’m an ecologist from the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, so I do research and I’ve become really interested in citizen science because I care about the science that can be done, and by engaging lots of people over a long term, you can do science, over vast scales, across the country and for many, many decades. And it can be sustainable in a way that isn’t sustainable when relying upon professionals. But I am also really interested in citizen science it’s a way that ordinary people, anyone, can be involved.