Question: What do "The Avengers," improv comedy and a Hyperspectral Infrared Imager all have in common? Answer: A new partnership to assist the science community to more effectively communicate their science. NASA/JPL’s Innovation Foundry teamed up with a veteran of the entertainment industry to develop techniques to help scientists think differently about how they communicate their science through storytelling. Expressing a new idea is difficult. It is particularly so when your new idea is a complex scientific concept or finding. Adding to the challenge of clear communication is the diversity of target audiences.  These range from the interdisciplinary science community to key stakeholders with focused agendas to the broad public. Our Story/Telling workshop consists of two parts. The Story focuses on creating science narratives that are “get-able”. Avoiding things like jargon, the “curse of knowledge”, and complexity. And the Telling demonstrates skills to make your presentation more engaging. This maximizes the impact of those stories on your audience.

Learning activities will include exercises to help you structure your data as a narrative (Story) and presentation training based on theatre games (Telling). 
We predict these will provide attendees with practical, hands-on methods of how to apply best practices. This experiential approach facilitates greater absorption of the content. The techniques will allow you to connect your science with your audience in ways that are compelling and "get-able” to a wide range of audiences.

We hope to attract anyone who communicates science in any capacity, particularly to interdisciplinary and broader audiences.

Price

$75 (regular)/$40 (student)