Policy

This post has taken me longer than I thought it would, lots going on!

FREE STUFF

I was at the British Ecological Society policy training workshop on Tuesday! And what a day it was.

At first I was worried, as the day started with free pens and badges and note books with bees on. And we all know how I feel about bees. And free things. So I was wary that the day may have peaked too soon, but I needn't have worried!!

The workshop started with an exercise. We all popped our anxieties, inhibitions and other negative feelings towards dealing with all aspects of the policy world, onto post its. This was quite cathartic, and proved that everyone has similar hesitations.

One side of the post it walls.

There were lots of inspiring and super interesting talks throughout the day, I'm going to chat about a few that I really connected with.

The first was from Sasha Leigh from NERC. Sasha's talk gave a great overview of the policy cycle, and of all the different houses and committees there are. She  also highlighted the different ways that we can get involved and influence. And the different ways NERC can help us get involved and influence! I had a great chat with Sasha during the lunch break about how exciting it is being part of NERC. NERC have so many opportunities with which they want to help you grow as a scientist and help you get to where you want to be!

I was really looking forward to the talk from Jonny Wentworth from the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology. Mainly because I am in the process of applying for a BES POST fellowship. One of the things that Jonny said that stuck with me is that most policy is made as a reaction, so I am going to keep myself up to date, just in case something happens that makes my science fit! The fact that there is also no obligation for policy to be evidence based, really got me thinking. It must make it hard to be the scientist who submits the evidence and sees everything go the other way! Jonny also spoke a lot about uncertainty, which is one of the most difficult things to communicate accurately. And gave a cool paper to read on the topic, which I'll be getting into soon. He also have some really great tips for good practice...but alas I had to pop out for those two slides, much to my dismay. I have been promised that they will be emailed round though!!

I <3 Darwin, so this was pretty exciting.

We had some great exercises. Two involved journal papers which we were all sent to read prior to the day. The first paper exercise was to summarise the paper onto one side of A4. We did this in groups and it was so difficult, especially as we only had 10 mins in which to do it. Our group had Greg McInery who saved us by drawing a brilliant visualisation, but we paired it with too much writing alas.

The second started with us relating our science to the different priority issues in the paper. And ended with us attempting to relate our science to a box of chocolates. I didn't attempt this last one, I have given up chocolate for lent, and as that was the prize I had no motivation! And I coildi think of a way!

Throughout the day solutions were added to the walls of the coffee room and the post it notes were being rearranged into different groups with their potential solutions. I have some nice panoramics so you can see what I mean! It was great to have a visualisation of everything coming together!

Overall I had an amazing day, met some amazing people and have come away with a renewed sense of vigour for all things policy!!