"Working collaboratively to maximise the value of the UK's environmental observations"
Newsletter of the UK Environmental Observation Framework
In this issue: Best Practice in Citizen Science Workshop I Environmental Citizen Science POSTnote I Monitoring in Action Conference I Catalogue Upgrade I UKEOF Staff Changes I Community News and Events
On 19th September 2014, UKEOF organised a workshop on "Best Practice in Citizen Science: Invasive Non-native Species". 50 people from across the public sector, NGOs and academia attended the workshop which was very successful and provided an excellent opportunity for attendees to come together and engage in useful discussions.
The workshop was held in partnership with the Marine Biological Association, National Biodiversity Network, Promoting the Effective Governance of the Channel Ecosystem (PEGASEAS), and the British Ecological Society Special Interest Groups in Citizen Science and Invasive Species.
The focus of the workshop was on sharing best practice in the monitoring of invasive non-native species across marine, freshwater and terrestrial environments and included a keynote talk from John Sawyer, the new Chief Executive at the NBN. The workshop report and presentations will be available on the UKEOF website soon.
A POSTnote has been published by the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology on the topic of environmental citizen science. The UKEOF Citizen Science Working Group were among the contributors to this POSTnote. The document gives an excellent overview of environmental citizen science and a key area that the note addresses is the issue around the quality of data provided by citizen science.
Protecting Scotland's Biodiversity: Monitoring in Action Conference
On Friday 3rd October, UKEOF attended the "Protecting Scotland's Biodiversity: Monitoring in Action Conference, organised by the Chartered Institute of Ecology and Environmental Management, British Ecological Society and the Science and Technical Group of the Scottish Biodiversity Strategy. We demonstrated our upgraded Catalogue at the event and our Citizen Science Working Group facilitated a workshop during the event on New Technologies and Approaches for Citizen Science.
In case you missed the launch of our upgraded Catalogue, we launched the new version in June this year. The
upgraded Catalogue was developed for UKEOF by the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology and has enhanced functionality and the ability to display geolocation information about environmental monitoring activities. If you would like to find out more about the Catalogue please contact the UKEOF team: office@ukeof.org.uk
UKEOF Staff Changes
After five years with UKEOF, we say goodbye to Amber Vater who will be working full-time within NERC. Andrea Turner has also left the UKEOF Secretariat following a promotion to work full-time within NERC. We are sad to lose Amber and Andrea's knowledge and experience but wish them all the best in their new roles.
Lucy Hopewell has started with UKEOF on a part-time basis. Lucy spends the rest of her working time as a Science Programme Officer within NERC, and we are delighted to welcome her to the team.
Royal Society Project
The Royal Society are undertaking a project on "Optimising the benefits of environmental observation for the UK". Further information can be found on the Royal Society website
Space for Smarter Government 2nd Call
Space for Smarter Government have issued an Invitation to Tender for their 2nd Call for the Space for Smarter Government Programme, for the Environment Focal Area. The closing date is 31st October 2014 and more information can be found at: http://www.spaceforsmartergovernment.uk/
NBN Conference
The 14th NBN Annual Conference is taking place on Friday 21st November at The Royal Society in London. The theme is "Climate, Collaboration and Collection - informing the new conservation agenda". More information can be found on the NBN website
SEWeb Project Finder
Scotland's Environment Web unveiled their online Project Finder earlier this year. This allows potential volunteers to search for projects within Scotland and enables organisations and schemes to advertise their citizen science projects and find keen volunteers. The Project Finder can be found at: http://apps.environment.scotland.gov.uk/project-finder/
For further information about UKEOF's work, please contact us at office@ukeof.org.uk
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