EUSEA President Markus Weißkopf and Brian Trench, President of the PCST Network for the Public Communication for Science and Technology, have signed a Memorandum of Understanding between the two organisations. This formal agreement took effect on 30 September 2017, committing both PCST and EUSEA to publicise and attend each others’ conferences, and to seek other opportunities for collaboration.
The PCST Network seeks to promote new ideas, methods, intellectual and practical questions, and perspectives on the communication of science and technology. Specifically, it aims to:
- improve the theoretical understanding of science communication by providing a forum to consider the latest developments
- improve the practice of science communication by providing a forum to consider strategies and methods
- promote an exchange between practitioners and theoreticians, to improve both the study and practice of science communication.
Members of the PCST Network come from a range of backgrounds: Researchers working on the theory and practice of science communication, staff at science centres and museums, science journalists, communication staff working for research organisations, students on the ethics and philosophy of science and the public, writers and editors of scientific material, web designers, scientists who communicate with the public and visual and performing artists working on science themes.
The next EUSEA board meeting in Bern, Switzerland, 11-12 October 2017, will discuss how to make this collaboration as alive and fruitful as possible. EUSEA aims to be represented at the PCST conference in Dunedin, New Zealand. Both organisations were represented at the recent Beijing Science Festival.
Among EUSEA members are many who hold a dual membership of the two organisations, such former EUSEA director Jan Riise, who is now a member of the PCST Scientific Committee.
