Our science storytelling team came together to organize a Science-in-Action Storytelling event on November 28, 2023 at the New Jersey Institute for Food, Nutrition, and Health. One hundred and sixty attendees were able to see some of the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences (SEBS) and New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station (NJAES) scientists’ work that is making an impact around the world through the viewing of student-led short science documentaries. Read more about the event here.
Science Stories
We use video storytelling to share how farmers and scientists are working together to find new and better ways to feed the people.
Based on Dena Seidel’s science-in-action storytelling model, Our collaborative team of scientists, researchers, professors, and students work together with community members to create science-in-action videos which follow their journeys to solve real world problems. This collaborative model, based on long-term trusting partnerships between scientists and video storytellers, documents scientists as they conduct their research and together create narratives intended to humanize scientists as authentic people on journeys of discovery.
‘Women of Nsongwe’
The Women Of Nsongwe was directed, filmed and edited by Rutgers Center for Digital Film-making student Jean-Paul Issacs in Zambia, Africa. Narrated by rural women in southern Zambia, this short film features the USAID funded research of Professor Jim Simon and his African based NGO ASNAPP-Zambia team, providing women farmers with the means to economic independence.
‘Fields of Devotion’
Fields of Devotion is a 30 minute documentary featuring Rutgers scientists and their efforts to create disease resistant food crops for New Jersey farmers. Featuring Rutgers Plant Biology scientists Jim Simon, Lara Brindisi and Kirsten Allen and NJ Farmers John Vannini, Jess Niederer and Mike O’Hara.
‘Antarctic Edge: 70° South’
Rutgers produced feature film Antarctic Edge: 70 º South documents an international team of scientists studying the impact of climate change along the West Antarctic Peninsula led by oceanographer Dr Oscar Schofield. Antarctic Edge: 70 º South is funded by the National Science Foundation and is directed by Dena Seidel. Fourteen undergraduate students from a variety of academic majors were involved in the film’s creative production.
Science Storytelling in the News
Faculty and researchers from our Plant Biology department and the Marine and Coastal Science department at the School of Environmental and Biological sciences (SEBS) and the Department of 4-H Youth Development at New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station (NJAES), in collaboration with Carlton College’s Science Education Resource Center (SERC), have been awarded a four-year $748,698 USDA NIFA Food and Agricultural Non-formal Education Program grant to make this project a reality.
The grant, “Food, Agriculture, and MarinE (FAME) 4-H Ag Tech Program,” will support 100 underserved high school youth to direct and produce short Food Systems Solution Science video stories as part of a 4-H positive youth development afterschool program. This program builds upon the innovative science-in-action video storytelling model developed at Rutgers, as well as the recent community impact of our science-in-action film, Fields of Devotion, and the success of the RUCAFE FAME pilot project.
Read more about FAME here, and visit our page to see the work of the amazing FAME students.