The Citizen Science Association also known as the CSA is a member based professional organization for practitioners and researchers of
citizen science
Citizen science (CS) (similar to community science, crowd science, crowd-sourced science, civic science, participatory monitoring, or volunteer monitoring) is scientific research conducted with participation from the public (who are sometimes re ...
. The CSA was founded in 2013 in the United States and was ruled a charitable organization with a 501c3 designated status in June 2017.
Ubiquity Press
Founded in 2008 by Brian Hole, Ubiquity Press is an academic publisher focusing on open access, peer-reviewed scholarship. Ubiquity Press is a part oUbiquity which also provides full publishing infrastructure and services to university presses, a ...
publishes an open source peer reviewed journal called Citizen Science: Theory and Practice on behalf of The Citizen Science Association.
History
The concept for the Citizen Science Association originated at the Public Participation for Scientific Research Conference in 2012 held in conjunction with the
Ecological Society of America
The Ecological Society of America (ESA) is a professional organization of ecological scientists. Based in the United States and founded in 1915, ESA publications include peer-reviewed journals, newsletters, fact sheets, and teaching resources. I ...
conference in
Portland, Oregon
Portland (, ) is a port city in the Pacific Northwest and the largest city in the U.S. state of Oregon. Situated at the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers, Portland is the county seat of Multnomah County, the most populous co ...
. Through a series of
NSF
NSF may stand for:
Political organizations
*National Socialist Front, a Swedish National Socialist party
*NS-Frauenschaft, the women's wing of the former German Nazi party
*National Students Federation, a leftist Pakistani students' political gr ...
grants
DRL-0610363DRL-1020909 an
DRL-0813135 the network of citizen science projects and professionals was further developed and the Citizen Science Association formation as an official organization developed along with a website. The
Cornell Lab of Ornithology
The Cornell Lab of Ornithology is a member-supported unit of Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, which studies birds and other wildlife. It is housed in the Imogene Powers Johnson Center for Birds and Biodiversity in Sapsucker Woods Sanctuar ...
hosted the beginning of the Association web content and the Schoodic Institute helped launch the organization and is a continuing fiscal sponsor the CSA.
Activities
The association also holds a professional focused conference series every two years for the practitioner and research community to discuss the best practices in citizen science titled the Citizen Science Association Conference or CitSciXXXX where XXXX would be replaced by the year. For example, CitSci2019 was held March 13–19, 2019. The association has a board of directors elected by the members and a collection of professional working groups establishing standards, identifying best practices, focusing research, building technology, and exploring the ethics of Citizen Science.
The Citizen Science Association has a memorandum of understanding with other Citizen Science Associations for collaboration and coordination. These other organizations include the
European Citizen Science Association, the
Australian Citizen Science Association, and the forming communities and associations in Asia (CitizenScience.Asia) and Africa. The United Nations officially recognised the Citizen Science Association and is working with the
Citizen Science Global Partnership on how citizen science can best be applied to help tackle the
Sustainable Development Goals
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) or Global Goals are a collection of 17 interlinked objectives designed to serve as a "shared blueprint for peace and prosperity for people and the planet, now and into the future".United Nations (2017) R ...
.
Citizen Science Association working groups
The working groups as with many professional organizations focus on priority areas of the science and practice of citizen science. As of February 2020 the following nine working groups have formed.
# Citizen Science Month
# Data and Metadata
# Education
# Ethics
# Environmental Justice Practitioners
# Integrity, Diversity, and Equity
# Law and Policy
# Professional Development
# Research and Evaluation
Citizen Science: Theory and Practice
Citizen Science Association has a Ubiquity Press published, open-access, peer-reviewed journal called
Citizen Science: Theory and Practice. Rather than focusing on reporting citizen science projects' scientific outcomes, but reporting research, review and synthesis, case studies, essays, methods, and meeting reports.
The journal is published online throughout the year along with special article collections.
See also
List of citizen science projects
Citizen science projects are activities sponsored by a wide variety of organizations so non-scientists can meaningfully contribute to scientific research. Activities vary widely from transcribing old ship logbooks to digitize the data as part of ...
References
External links
Citizen Science Association WebsiteCitizen Science: Theory and PracticeSchoodic Institute and the Citizen Science AssociationCitizen Science Global PartnershipCitizen Science Association Working Groups
Citizen science
{{CitizenScienceNavBox