Let's Talk SciComm

Got a ridiculously long to-do list? Feeling overwhelmed by all the stuff you need to get done? Time management is something we all struggle with and it can sometimes be difficult to make time to share our work with different audiences. This week Jen and Michael invite our wonderful UniMelbSciComm colleagues, Linden Ashcroft, Catriona Nguyen-Robertson and Graham Phillips for a 5-way chat about the tips and tricks we've learned along the way about how to make time for the things that really matter to us. 

Transcript: https://go.unimelb.edu.au/56pe

This week, Jen and Michael were delighted to speak with Dr Michael Winlo. Michael is Managing Director at Emyria, a data-driven, drug development and clinical services company focused on improving care of patients with unmet needs. Emyria leverages the clinical evidence created with patients to launch and register novel drug development and treatment programs with global regulators.

Michael is also a Director at Linear Clinical Research - Perth’s only dedicated early phase cancer and clinical trial unit. Michael was previously CEO at Linear which, under his leadership, was the first site in Australia to complete a comprehensive digital transformation. Prior to Linear, Michael lived and worked in Silicon Valley leading the Health team at Palantir working with major healthcare institutions in the US and UK to solve complex data integration and analysis challenges. Michael is a medical doctor with an MBA from Stanford and holds several data analysis patents.

You can learn more about Michael and Emyria here:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/mwinlo

Transcript: https://go.unimelb.edu.au/v6pe

Applying for grants is an experience common to all researchers and with success rates for many funding schemes extremely low, any advice to improve the chance of success for your application is very welcome!

In this episode, Jen and Michael were thrilled to have the chance to chat with Jonathan O’Donnell and to pick his brains about how to write a successful grant application.a

Jonathan is the right person to seek advice from because in his job, he helps people get funding for their research. To be specific, he helps the people in the Faculty of Science at the University of Melbourne in Australia (all opinions are his own). He has been doing that, on and off, since the 1990's (with varying degrees of success). He loves his job. He loves it so much that he has enrolled in a PhD to look at crowdfunding for research. With Tseen Khoo, he runs the Research Whisperer blog and @ResearchWhisper Twitter stream, about doing research in academia. His ORCID is 0000-0001-5435-235X.

And if you’re interested in learning more about crowdfunding, you can look forward to an episode in our next season in which we chat with Jonathan again and learn all about the role of crowdfunding in research. Stay tuned!

In the meantime, you can follow Jonathan and learn more about his work here:

https://twitter.com/jod999

https://au.linkedin.com/in/jod999

https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5435-235X

https://researchwhisperer.org/

https://twitter.com/researchwhisper

Transcript: https://go.unimelb.edu.au/d6pe

This week we are so excited to catch up with one of our University of Melbourne Science Communication alumni who is doing amazing things in the world!

Kate Cranney is a science communicator, scientist and visual artist. She combines these skills in her role as a Communications Advisor with CSIRO, Australia's national science agency.

Kate's background is diverse. She's climbed trees in Borneo, scaled volcanoes in Papua New Guinea, pulled snakes out of traps in the Simpson Desert, and counted turtle hatchlings in Solomon Islands … all in the name of science. With interests spanning ecology, the arts, science writing, education, podcasts and film, science communication was a natural fit. In her current role, she creates communication materials, delivers communications campaigns, liaises with the media, and runs storytelling training for the approximately 850 scientists in CSIRO's Land and Water, and Energy divisions.

Kate holds a Master of Science (with Distinction), and a dual Bachelor of Laws / Environmental Science (with Honours). In 2018 she spent 10 months travelling as part of an ISSI Fellowship in Science Communication. She visited museums, aquariums and other science organisations in Scandinavia, Europe, Canada and the USA. Her task? To learn from the most creative, novel and effective forms of science communication, and to bring that knowledge back to Australia!

This is the visualisation of Ira Glass’ ‘The Gap’ Kate mentions in the conversation: https://vimeo.com/85040589

You can follow Kate and see more of her work here:

https://katecranney.com

https://twitter.com/kateccranney

https://www.instagram.com/kate.cranney.art

https://www.linkedin.com/in/kate-cranney-71864923

Transcript: https://go.unimelb.edu.au/t6pe

Writing a thesis is hard! It’s probably the longest document you’ve ever had to write, and the experience is often accompanied by a tendency to procrastinate and feelings of overwhelm and imposterism.

This episode will help! Jen and Michael briefly talk about their thesis writing experiences and share their top tips. But most of the episode is filled with advice and tips from eight of our UniMelb SciComm alumni who have recently written theses. They’ve been right where you are now and have so much wisdom to share!

You’ll hear from Nancy Rivers Tran, Owen Missen, Samantha Ward, Xavier Busuttil-Crellin, Kate Huckstep, Adam Hagg, Emily McColl-Gausden and Lachlan Tegart.

Plus here are a couple of resources to help you:

How to write a Better Thesis by David Evans, Justin Zobel and Paul Gruba

Explorations of Style - A brilliant blog about academic writing. Start by checking out their "How to use this blog" page to get an idea of what articles they have to offer

The Thesis Whisperer - Another fantastic blog worth following - full of honest, upfront advice, especially on research during a pandemic

Patter - Another great blog about academic writing

DoctoralWriting SIG - Very useful blog covering lots of interesting and relevant topics, with an entire category dedicated to thesis writing

Transcript: https://go.unimelb.edu.au/m6pe

This week, we couldn’t be more thrilled to chat with James McCaw, Professor of Mathematical Biology in the School of Mathematics and Statistics at the University of Melbourne. James studied physics before embarking on a research career in infectious diseases epidemiological modelling. One of his primary research interests over the past 15 years has been pandemic preparedness and response.

Since January 2020, he has supported the Australian government's response to COVID-19 through membership of key national committees and leadership of a research program evaluating the transmission dynamics of COVID-19 in Australia.

We’re so chuffed James was able to find the time to chat with us about communicating science during a pandemic.

You can learn more about James here:

https://twitter.com/j_mccaw

https://www.science.org.au/covid19/experts/james-mccaw

https://www.linkedin.com/in/james-mccaw-863b0b1/

https://theconversation.com/tired-of-lockdown-rules-our-analysis-shows-most-australians-have-curbed-mixing-and-helped-suppress-covid-168946

Transcript: https://go.unimelb.edu.au/46pe

If you haven’t yet taken part in a speaking competition like the Three-minute thesis (3MT) or Famelab, what are you waiting for? You’ll gain so much by working out how to explain your research in a really short amount of time.

This week Michael and Jen are joined by our wonderful colleague Catriona Nguyen-Robertson, who has had great success in a number of speaking competitions.

Together, we give all our best advice on how to prepare and deliver a brilliant short talk. We also have excellent tips for you from our alumni Kate Huckstep and Sarah McColl-Gausden.

Plus here are a couple of resources to help you:

How to Become an Authentic Speaker

Transcript: https://go.unimelb.edu.au/f6pe

Welcome back to Season Three of Let’s Talk SciComm – we couldn’t be more excited to be back talking about science communication with you.

To launch our new season, we’re joined by the fabulous (and funny) Dr Jessamyn A. Fairfield, a lecturer in the School of Physics at the National University of Ireland Galway. She leads research in neuromorphic nanomaterials, physics education, and public engagement with science. She is also an award-winning science communicator, and the director of Bright Club Ireland, a comedy night bringing academic research to the public.

You can follow Jessamyn and learn more about her work here:

http://jessamynfairfield.com/

Transcript: https://go.unimelb.edu.au/h6pe

#MyScienceMay

Transcript: https://go.unimelb.edu.au/my8e

Procrastination is of the biggest challenges many of us come up against in our day-to-day work. And it can certainly be a major barrier to effective science communication. Whether you’re trying to write a thesis, an assignment or a blog post, chances are you’ve found yourself delaying getting started.

This week Jen and Michael share their experiences of procrastination and evidence-based advice on how to stop. Two of our wonderful UniMelbSciComm alumni, Caitlin Minney and Lily Ahlemeyer also share their experiences and advice about how to tackle procrastination.

Here are some resources to support you in tackling procrastination:

Inside the Mind of a Master Procrastinator - Tim Urban’s TED talk

Plus a couple of tools we use to help beat procrastination:

Forest App – focusing on your work helps you build a virtual forest

Transcript: https://go.unimelb.edu.au/4y8e