Natalia Bateman1, Jo Condon2, Dr. Kelsey Druken1, Dr. Christina Hall4, Emma Joughin3, Kerry Mora5
1ACCESS-NRI: Australia's Climate Simulator, ACTON, Australia, 2AuSCope, Melbourne, Australia, 3AURIN, Melbourne, Australia, 4Australian BioCommons, Melbourne, Australia, 5Australian Access Federation (AAF), Adelaide, Australia
Biography:
Natalia Bateman (she/her) is the Outreach and Engagement Manager at Australia's Climate Simulator (ACCESS-NRI). A biologist with a master's in history and philosophy of science and science communication, she has over 15 years of experience in science engagement. Natalia has translated research spanning fish ecology, photosynthesis and agriculture. Since 2022 she has been working on the unique challenge of conveying climate modeling's significance and the importance of the ACCESS-NRI’s infrastructure to understand and predict climate change.
Jo Condon (she/her) is a geologist, communicator, and strategic designer currently working at AuScope, that supports people working on Earth systems challenges in Australia with laboratories, instruments, data, software, and expertise. Jo is dedicated to applying evidence-based methods to enhance the impact of science on society and the environment and equity for all Australians in Earth systems.
Dr. Kelsey Druken is the Associate Director for Release Management and responsible for the software, data and training portfolio at ACCESS-NRI, Australia's Climate Simulator. She holds a PhD in Oceanography from the University of Rhode Island and prior to her current role, was the Associate Director of Data Management at the National Computational Infrastructure (NCI).
Dr. Christina Hall is the Australian BioCommons Associate Director (Training and Communications). This national role delivers bioinformatics training, community building and communications activities to life science researchers. Christina’s early training as a plant pathologist has informed how she helps scientists engage with collaborative digital research infrastructure in roles at Melbourne Bioinformatics, EMBL Australia Bioinformatics Resource, The University of Melbourne and the Victorian Life Sciences Computation Initiative. She brings a breadth of experience from science communication positions across the private, university, government and museum sectors.
Emma Joughin is the Head of Marketing for the Australian Urban Research Infrastructure Network. (AURIN) Emma promotes the real world impact of what researchers can do using world-class NRIs and uninhibited access to urban data. Emma is driven by translating research knowledge and highlighting the unseen infrastructure that underpins transformative research outcomes. The expertise, technology and data access that facilitates improvements in our urban environment. Emma is firmly rooted in spatial data and GIS—she has her hand on the heartbeat of urban habitats and what makes our communities thrive.
Kerry Mora is the Communications Manager at the Australian Access Federation (AAF), responsible for promoting AAF’s role in enabling trusted access across the research and higher education sector. As a strategic communications and marketing manager with over 20 years’ experience, she has held various roles including leading communications and marketing activity across STEM and Research at the University of South Australia.
Abstract:
Measuring and communicating impact to funders and users is key to the continuity of research enablers. Yet measuring the less visible contributions of research infrastructures to research outcomes remains a formidable challenge.
This Birds-of-a-Feather session (BoF) invites all conference attendees including service providers, researchers and communicators, to share their perspectives on evaluating and communicating research infrastructures’ impact.
Australia’s national research infrastructures (NRIs) play a pivotal role in research and innovation in every discipline including climate science, astronomy, health, data and more. Without them, researchers do not have access to the tools, data, facilities and technical expertise to support their endeavours.
Australia counts more than 28 national research infrastructure projects enabled by the Australian Government through the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS).
A panel of communications, engagement and strategy experts from across Australia’s NRI’s will showcase the different ways they have approached the challenge of measuring and communicating their multifaceted impacts. This will be followed by an open-floor discussion on topics decided by the session attendees.
These can include:
What are some practical tools and best practices to enhance the visibility, understanding and acknowledgement of NRIs?
How effective is the Impact Framework for NRIs?
What is the best way of articulating the far-reaching impacts of NRIs, including fostering interdisciplinary collaboration, capacity building and innovation?
A key outcome of this session is a report to share with the Department of Education and the NCRIS Communicators Network.
This proposal is coordinating with the proposed ARDC BoF on “Uptake of digital research infrastructure.”