Communicate Your Science Workshop
April 4th 2025
Earlies this April, I got to visit the beautiful Chichely Hall for the Communicate Your Science Workshop along with 20 other early career scientists from across the UK and Europe. We were all there to learn how to talk about the cool science we do, without putting anyone to sleep. It was very hands on with lots of opportunity to test out the theory we would have heard hours before. The focus was on speaking to a general audience - yes, real live people!
The workshop kicked off with a crash course into what separates science communication from giving public lectures - what we typically do in conferences. Prof. Alison Woollard told us that storytelling is how humans make sense of the world and science is no exception at that. She told us to wrap our scientific work in stories that everyone can enjoy and not cradle it with terminology. Prof. Jonathan Pettit followed up with a session on building narrative structure - turning a presentiation with bullet points into a story that people will actually want to hear. First Crate the Media gave a brilliant session on body language, vocal deivery, and how to present ourselves in a way that invites the audience into our talks. After a short prep time, we were all asked to gve a two-minute talk about our work in a fun, engaging way.
On day 2, things got exciting. We were going to be performing a stand up set on our research or our experiences in science. Helen Keen, a professional stand up comedian, walked us through how we would do this. We were shown a clip of Prof. Jonathan Pettit’s Brightclub performance, which set a pretty high bar. Helen did an excellent job of easing out the nerves and giving us the tools to write our routines. We had a couple of hours to write some jokes. It was scary going up to speak, wondering whether or not the jokes will land. I had fun writing the jokes so I felt I was content with that session already. Honestly, it was not as scary as we were expecting, and once we finished most of us were ready to give it another go - who doesn’t like being a bit of a clown (not just me right?).
Sarah Cosgriff spoke about how to make our science communication more inclusive, and how to account for and accomodate the requirements of all people, to ensure that no one feels left out. We wrapped the day with a mock science festival, where we designed outreach stalls in teams using a big box of craft supplies. The arts and crafts session that it turned into was a welcome way to unwind after the stand up session. We went to each other’s stands pretending to be visiting family, to review each other’s work.
The last session shifted the focus to making short form videos. The rise of Tiktok, Instagram Reels, has changed the way we consume media, science communication being a rising part of that. It makes sense to learn how to make minute long clips of science to get people excited to want to know more. Dr. Sally Le Page, walked us through the nuts and bolts of film making, teaching us about writing, filming and editing videos. We were told about how to plan our shoots from lighting considerations, to capturing clear sound, ways to keep the video professional and clean. Importantly, we were told what can be edited in post and what we have to absolutely get right when filming. This was my attempt at being an influencer.
The workshop, all in all, was intense, exciting and I came out much more confident. I can now better talk about my science at a party or event without it being a lecture. I think it’s extremely important to talk about science because the process of discovery is exciting, and fascinating and shouldn’t be gatekept behind academic jargon. The CYS workshop in particular was an excellent chance to learn how to speak about your science, how to make it funny and engaging and how to make cool Tiktok videos to add a refreshing twist to everyone’s algorithm.