News Archive

24 September 2006

QIP IRC/QAP IP Science Communication Workshop


Science Communication Workshop took place at St Anne’s College, Oxford , 25th – 26th September 2006

Category: General
Posted by: webmaster

Have you ever wanted the chance to fine tune your communication skills with a variety of different target audiences? Do you want to get school students fired up about Quantum Information Processing? How can you explain what you do to the media and to politicians in the right language?

This two-day course will be led by Wendy Sadler, Director of science made simple, and Paul Roche, who are both established science communicators. They will give an overview of what you need to consider when addressing different groups. It will provide practical opportunities to improve your presenting style and see how it can be adjusted for different situations. With additional input from broadcasting professionals you will also have the chance to practice your TV and radio interview skills and learn some tactics for dealing with the media in general. Come prepared to think creatively about what you do and approach it from a whole new angle! Video feedback will be used to help you improve your skills in a supportive environment. Tim Gardam, Principal of St Anne’s College and former Director of Television and Director of Programmes at Channel 4, will also contribute.

Registration is now open for the workshop. The workshop will be in collaboration between QIP IRC and QAP IP. The workshop will be open to participants at all stages of seniority, including senior members of faculty and those who already have considerable experience of communicating to non-specialists. The cost of participating for members of QIP IRC and QAP IP will be met by their host collaborations, with members of QIP IRC meeting travel costs from local grants. In order to optimize the interactive nature of the workshop, the number of delegates will be limited to 16. To avoid disappointment, please register without delay, and in any case before 6th September 2006. Please register using the form on this website.

Participants will be asked to prepare two types of presentation in advance.

1. A simple five minute demonstration of some element of science which ISN'T connected directly to your research. You should use a prop that you can find around the house (cups, balloons, elastic bands, plastic bottles etc) and the demonstration should be aimed at school students at Key Stage 3 (who are aged 11-14 yrs). You must use a practical demonstration or get the people in the audience involved somehow by volunteering. You are not to use PowerPoint or similar slides for this exercise. If you are stuck for inspiration you can look at the simple science experiments on http://www.sciencemadesimple.co.uk ; Planet science also has lots of ideas

http://www.planet-science.com

2. A five minute pitch of your research area to a parliamentary group who are considering the economical and ethical implications of your research on the UK community. You will need to get them up to speed on what your research is about in non-technical language, and show that you have considered how the research will be used in business or as an applied technology. If there may be ethical implications on the use of the research you should highlight that you have considered that. You may use PowerPoint slides for this part, but are limited to 5 slides max, with no more than 30 words on each slide.


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