The California Environmental Legacy Project: A multiplatform educational media project about environmental change

Background/Question/Methods

Public understanding of the causes and consequences of environmental change is lacking.  At the same time, scientists often do not have sufficient training, pedagogical expertise, and/or media support to effectively communicate with public audiences about complex and multi-scale ecological phenomena. The California Environmental Legacy Project is a collaborative effort among scientists, educators, and media professionals to build a new model of educational media production that will enhance public understanding about environmental change and our relationship to a changing environment. Slated for completion in 2013, the Legacy Project will deliver a multiplatform educational media package that includes 1) a two-hour public television documentary on environmental change in California (working title: Becoming California); 2) visitor center films and video podcasts produced for five state and national parks in California; and 3) a visually rich, interactive and searchable web/mobile interface that delivers the project’s educational media on multiple devices and through a variety of social and professional networks. Intended audiences of the project’s media include public television viewers, visitors to California state and national parks, users of online educational resources, and K-12 and university students and teachers. As participants in its collaborative working groups, the project’s professional audience includes park interpretive staff, scientists, teachers, and media professionals. STEM content includes geology, earth science, evolution, biodiversity, and climate change. Audience evaluation and research are being used to test a new model of educational media production and delivery that builds capacity and impacts audiences in new ways. 

Results/Conclusions

Audience research conducted on California residents, public television viewers and informal science educators informed initial development of the project’s media. Results of these surveys indicated that most Californians do not understand the relationship between human activities and environmental change. Nor do they feel connected to nature. The next phase of research will provide audience feedback on draft scripts, rough cuts of films and overall effectiveness of the project’s media. Audience research will examine how the project’s integrated media package can enhance understanding of different but interconnected scales of environmental change, from the very large to the personal, as well as the degree to which new digital media can inspire audiences to connect with nature.