Enhancing synergy across citizen science projects to engage diverse audiences and address grand science challenges at a single location: Acadia National Park, Maine

The scientific and educational benefits of citizen science projects are often limited because they attract relatively narrow audiences or are narrowly focused. For example, a project might engage a small set of people very... [ view full abstract ]

The scientific and educational benefits of citizen science projects are often limited because they attract relatively narrow audiences or are narrowly focused. For example, a project might engage a small set of people very deeply in many aspects of an ecological restoration experiment or another project. Participants might be limited to those people who have a lot of time and energy to invest. Alternatively, a project might engage a large number of people in collecting certain types of narrowly-defined observations, such as wildlife sightings or water samples. These relatively narrowly focused projects can limit the educational and experiential opportunities for volunteers, or the amount and type of data or other scientific outputs generated.

At the Schoodic Institute and in Acadia National Park, we are integrating a number of related citizen science projects that engage different audiences--e.g., one-day visitors, year-round volunteers, and week-long intensive volunteer experiences. The projects are intertwined and synergistic, and are all aimed at helping the park understand and respond to rapid environmental changes. This diversity of citizen science volunteer opportunities provides many points of entry for new volunteers, options for volunteers to apply skills learned in one project to a related but different project, and opportunities to learn new topics and skills. The diversity of projects also provides concrete scientific, education, and management benefits to the national park. Here we describe the rationale and initial lessons learned as we begin undertaking this strategy.