Abstract
Power to the People: Citizen Geography in Action
Track: User Presentations - Teaching
Authors: Sandra Henderson, Dennis Ward, Leah Wasser
Project BudBurst (budburst.org) is a national 'citizen geography' program designed to engage the public in environmental science by making and sharing observations of the timing of life cycle events in plants such as flowering, leafing, and fruiting. Project BudBurst provides the opportunity for students and interested laypersons to participate in authentic scientific research. This project is important from both an educational perspective and becasue it enables scientists to broaden the geographic and temporal scale of their observations. This on-line educational and data-entry program has engaged over 15,000 participants of all ages and walks of life. Project BudBurst is working with National Geographic FieldScope to develop data analysis and mapping tools to make access to the data more meaningful. Data and maps from Project BudBurst have been used in several scientific manuscripts. We will report on the results of the last six years of engaging the public in this biogeography program.