Communicators assemble! Sharing best practice across eResearch communications & outreach teams
Jana Makar1
1New Zealand eScience Infrastructure (NeSI), New Zealand
Situation
Within Australasia’s eResearch sector, there is a large community of practice for science and technology communications and outreach. Conferences like eResearch Australasia offer a valuable opportunity for comms practitioners to learn from each other, amplify shared stories, welcome new community members, and strengthen existing networks.
Task
Considering the annual Birds-of-a-Feather (BoF) approaches of other communities of practice (eg. Research Software Engineers (RSEs), digital skills training, etc.), what could that look like for the eResearch communications community? This session will aim to answer that question.
Action
As a starting point, this BoF will explore the appetite and interest for hosting an annual community of practice gathering for Australasian eResearch communications and outreach personnel. A conversation and brainstorming exercise will be used as a starting point to determine what future session objectives and formats could look like.
Result
With eResearch Australasia 2021 running online, this seems like an ideal year to broach the topic and potentially to reach a wider audience for the initial conversation. Ultimately, this session aims to better connect the members of this community of practice, support comms-focused knowledge-sharing between organisations, and potentially open new doors for collaboration.
Biography:
Based at the University of Auckland, Jana Makar coordinates a range of engagement initiatives and external communications to raise the profile of NeSI’s activities, impacts, and collaborations. Prior to joining NeSI, Jana worked as a communications professional for multiple organisations in Canada’s cyberinfrastructure sector, including Cybera (provincial research & education network), WestGrid (regional HPC consortium), and Compute Canada (national HPC platform). She has a degree in Communications from the University of Calgary and spent the early part of her career working as a journalist for weekly and daily newspapers in Western Canada.