Let's Talk SciComm

This week we were delighted to be joined by the wonderful Aśka (pronounced 'Ash-ka'; she/they): award-winning comics maker, visual storyteller, science communicator and former quantum physicist, whose career is a glorious collision of two worlds that rarely meet. Before the drawing board, Aśka earned a first-class honours degree in physics (complete with a university medal) and spent several years in quantum optics labs across Australia, Germany and Denmark, work she describes as tickling atoms until they give up their secrets and glow fluorescent green. 
Somewhere along the way she swapped the lab for the page, and has since published more than a dozen books and graphic novels, spent seven years touring Western Australia as a travelling science presenter with Scitech, and now teaches students of all ages how to "write with pictures". Their latest young adult graphic novel, The Friendship Paradox, draws all these threads together in the story of Dash, who tries to use the laws of physics to make sense of other people. It’s a stunning book about science, but even more about friendship, difference and self-acceptance.
Join us for a wonderful conversation about the leap from quantum optics to comics, why pictures sit unfairly at the bottom of our communication hierarchy, what years on the road taught Aśka about making science feel personal, and her lovely advice to pick up a concept and roll it around in your hands until you find a surprising new way in.
You can connect with Aśka and learn more about their work here: 
Aśka's website: askastorytelling.com

The Friendship Paradox (Allen & Unwin): https://www.allenandunwin.com/browse/book/A%C5%9Bka-Friendship-Paradox-9781761181689, a teaser of the book

The Cosmic Adventures of Alice and Bob: a free middle-grade comic Aśka co-created about research and searching in science

Qublings – Quantum Siblings, an award-winning comic about quantum entanglement: askastorytelling.com/short-comics

Aśka's blog post on science communication through pictures: askastorytelling.com/musings

Non-fiction middle-grade books Aśka has illustrated: Behind the Screens and How to Save the Whole Blinkin' Planet

Instagram: @askastorytelling

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/askastorytelling/

Ever had someone you care about listen to you talk about your work and ask, "so what?". It stings, but what if it's actually a gift? In this short episode, Jen and Michael reframe that deflating moment as one of the most useful questions you'll ever be asked: the very thing every funder, editor and audience member is quietly wondering anyway. They talk through how to answer it well: distinguishing why your work matters in your field from why it matters to the person in front of you, using the "five whys" to dig down to something they genuinely care about, and turning all those answers into a handful of ready-made hooks for different people and situations.
You can find more great advice here:
The Message Box. The signature (and free) science communication tool whose whole crux is the "So what? Why should your audience care?" question, with a different version built for each audience you want to reach.

Research contribution vs significance. A clear, recent piece from the wonderful Pat Thomson framing significance as the "so what?" of your work, warning against both the vague non-answer ("it's important because mental health matters") and underselling what you've done.

This week we were thrilled to be joined by the wonderful Alanta Colley - Naarm/ Melbourne-based comedian, science communicator and storyteller, and living proof that the path into science communication is rarely a straight line. With a background in international public health, Alanta spent two years doing public health work in rural eastern Uganda, coordinating HIV education, setting up mosquito-net micro-businesses and running sanitation campaigns. Along the way, she collected a few unwanted souvenirs in the form of several parasites. Rather than quietly moving on, she turned the experience into her first solo show, Parasites Lost, which sold out its entire run at the 2017 Melbourne International Comedy Festival. She's since written and toured a string of solo shows: Days of Our Hives on beekeeping, On the Origin of Faeces on the gut microbiome, and Trick or Treatment on the evidence behind alternative medicine, performing across Australia, New Zealand and for the Gates Foundation in Seattle, and she's the co-founder of Sci Fight, Melbourne's long-running science comedy debate series.
Join us for a fabulous chat about non-linear careers, what public health work in Uganda taught Alanta about listening and testing your assumptions, the delicate art of balancing "funny" with "too much information", why failure is one of the most powerful tools in both comedy and science communication, and her advice for anyone whose knees knock at the very thought of public speaking.
You can follow Alanta and find out more about her work here: 
Alanta on the Shirtloads of Science podcast: shirtloadsofscience.libsyn.com

Instagram: @alanta_colley and @sci_fight_science_comedy

https://www.linkedin.com/in/alanta-colley-2a018843/

Preparing for your thesis oral defence (the viva, the oral exam, whatever it's called in your neck of the woods) and quietly dreading it? In this short episode, Jen and Michael reframe the whole experience: your defence isn't an interrogation, it's a conversation between engaged and curious colleagues welcoming you into the field, not with adversaries who are hunting for holes. They share practical ways to prepare - knowing your discussion section inside out, planning honest and non-defensive answers to the questions you're dreading, and being upfront that every piece of research has its limitations. And with AI making it more important than ever to show you can talk candidly about your own work, they suspect oral defences are only going to become more common.
You can find more great advice here:
How to survive a thesis defence A classic, practical guide: you know your work better than anyone, the examiners aren't out to get you, and a pause to think is your friend.

The dreaded doctoral defense From The Thesis Whisperer, Australia's best-known PhD blog, on reframing the defence and preparing for the questions you're dreading.

How to present an effective and successful viva voce A thorough, recently updated guide making the same core point Jen and Michael do: the viva is a conversation, not an interrogation, and the common questions are entirely predictable.

The viva. From the UK's researcher-development body, which frames the viva as a chance to discuss your work with experienced experts and recommends a calm, non-confrontational approach to any criticism.

This week we were absolutely delighted (and, we'll admit, a little starstruck) to sit down with Dr Kit Prendergast: native bee researcher, taxonomist, conservation biologist, science communicator and performing artist, better known to many as Bee Babette. Kit came to science through a blend of the arts and the sciences, and that mix of creativity and rigour has come to define her career. She fell for native bees back in 2016, drawn in by macro photography and bee hotels, and went on to complete her PhD at Curtin University as a Forrest Research Scholar studying native bee biodiversity, urban pollination networks, and the genuinely contentious question of how introduced European honeybees affect our native species. Since then she's been remarkably prolific: more than 80 peer-reviewed papers, two brand-new bee species described (one named after her beloved dog, Zephyr), an award-winning science circus comedy show called The Birds & the Bees, a book, a swag of outreach awards, and a real knack for throwing out the rulebook on how scientists engage the public.
Join us for a fabulous conversation about falling in love with native bees, the trouble with "bee washing", why species names matter far more than you'd think, combining acrobatics with science on stage, and Kit's advice to be unapologetically your true self.
You can follow Kit and find out more about her work here: 
Everything Bee Babette on Patreon: patreon.com/cw/TheBeeBabette

Kit's Forrest Research profile: forrestresearch.org.au/profiles/dr-kit-prendergast

YouTube: The Bee Babette

Instagram: @dr.beebabette

LinkedIn: https://au.linkedin.com/in/dr-kit-prendergast-7b9250135

Facebook: Kit Prendergast, The Buzz on Wild Bees, and Creating a Haven for Native Bees