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SCAN Survey Results: Engaging the Public with Insect Digitization Workflows

SCAN Survey Results: Engaging the Public with Insect Digitization Workflows Dr. Melody Basham Hasbrouck Insect Collection Outreach Specialist Project Director Insect ARium Arizona State University. About SCAN (Southwest Collections of Arthropods Network).

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SCAN Survey Results: Engaging the Public with Insect Digitization Workflows

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  1. SCAN Survey Results: Engaging the Public with Insect Digitization Workflows Dr. Melody Basham Hasbrouck Insect Collection Outreach Specialist Project Director Insect ARium Arizona State University

  2. About SCAN (Southwest Collections of Arthropods Network) SCAN includes the following institutions: Northern Arizona UniversityUniversity of Arizona University of Colorado at Boulder Colorado State University Texas Tech University Texas AgriLife Research Arizona State University Denver Museum of Nature and Science New Mexico State University University of New Mexico

  3. Current Goals and Accomplishments to Date • In August SCAN had their first meet-up at Arizona State University • The goal is to develop a plan and a sustainable model that would allow for more specimens to be entered into the database. • SCAN plans to adopt and encourage the broader use of virtual collaboration • SCAN hopes to increase the rate of identification. • Has two websites. One site is informative, the other is a Symbiota portal hosted at iDigBio.   • 9 out of 10 SCAN collection members already have their data in the portal. • More than 30 videos are now up at YouTube for training purposes for SCAN. Video images were captured using Zoomify so that zooming is excellent. SCAN hopes to ultimately be able to act as an online Southwest Bug Guide. • Georeferencing is also a major goal of the SCAN TCN. SCAN is sending two graduate students to the georeferencing workshop to be trained to teach others for their TCN.

  4. 1. What do you believe is the greatest challenge in engaging the public with an insect digitization project?

  5. 2. Which of the following steps of the workflow would you view to be the easiest to engage the public in?

  6. 3. Which of the following steps of the workflow do you think would be the most difficult to engage the public in?

  7. 4. Which step of the digitization workflow do you think has the most potential to be integrated as a citizen science project?

  8. 5. What are your views to the value of crowdsourcing and or citizen science projects as an integral part of the digitization process?

  9. 6. To what extent do you think public participation in a digitization project should have meaningful significance in order for a program to be effective?

  10. 7. Based on your own experiences what challenges have you observed in having the public participate in the digitization workflow? Put NA if you do not presently have the public involved in your digitization process.

  11. 8. Are there any specific groups in the community who you would view as being valuable to your digitization project?

  12. 9. To what extent do you think new technologies such as mobile devices and social networking tools would make public participation in digitization projects more accessible?

  13. SOME KEY RESPONDENT COMMENTS It might be timing saving and would increase the quality of the data if we could capture images of the specimen labels. Developing a cyberinfrastructure environment would allow for the public to help us in a way that could be vetted by participating curators/data managers (Symbiota already has most, if not all, of the tools we would need to make this happen.) We need to make the process *fun* for the public. (meaningful) One could imagine a separate database or "class of data" within the SCAN database of data contributed by citizen scientists on any number of topics from phenology to identification tools. Other s commented on the need for field images The "digitization workflow" is what we need to capture data from our specimens I see that as separate than citizen science. That's not to say that this process could not also include citizen scientists. I am planning to engage the public for help in the data entry process, however I would be hesitant to call it a "citizen scientist project" since there would not necessarily be an immediate reward for the participants. (Lack of meaning)

  14. So what do the results suggest and what should be our focus? 60% viewed that digitization tasks should be purposeful and meaningful to the public. That data entry and imaging were the easiest tasks and would be the best task to integrate in citizen science. 70% viewed citizen science as to be an important to very important component of public involvement. Most SCAN groups (70%) of respondents are not currently engaging the public in the digitization process. The need to make working with insect labels accessible and user friendly. The need for a community portal. The need for field images to support existing collection.

  15. Democratize science • It can be used as a tool to include other ontological-based worldviews • It can be integrated with new technologies promoting wider outreach and public participation. • The results of the survey shows the need to have the public involved in digitization tasks that allows them to feel they have some ownership and or provides meaningful experiences. What we now know. . . Digitization of our collections serves science but it can also . .

  16. SCAN is currently looking at the possibility of a SCAN Mobile App There is a growing number of people who are iphoneographers (people with phone cameras) who are out in the field taking macro images of insects. These individuals could upload them via a mobile app which could then be vetted by SCAN curators/editors. The app would automatically georeference the images and could be connected to a community portal within Symbiota. These images could be used to cross-reference with existing specimens in SCAN collections. There are a number of mobile Apps that are being used as a tool in citizen science but do not necessarily connect with an institution-based collection or database.

  17. For more information about this presentation: Contact Melody Basham at melody.basham@asu.edu About SCAN contact Neil Cobb at Neil.Cobb@nau.edu

  18. INSECT DIGITIZATION AND NEW EDUCATIONAL TOOLS Currently the Hasbrouck Insect Collection at ASU is working with new technology and a digitization workflow that aims to connect the public with 3D images of specimens from the collection. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nCIS67h3oe0&feature=youtu.be

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