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Finally, help for science journalists
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December 8, 2009 - Posted by Regan Ray
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 When it comes to science stories, overworked reporters often resort to rounding up quotes from duelling experts, writes Peter Calamai. Enter the recently launched Science Media Centre of Canada, which will arm journalists with information and help them cover stories with science content.
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Science journalism in a connected future
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December 4, 2009 - Posted by Regan Ray
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 Public health officials, academics and researchers joined journalists including documentary producer Ira Basen, the Vancouver Sun's Kirk LaPointe, Canwest News Service’s Margaret Munro at a recent conference at the University of British Columbia that asked "how and where the science journalists of tomorrow will work." Concordia University assistant professor David Secko captured some of the highlights.
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Allergic Living editor confronts Chatelaine article
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November 11, 2009 - Posted by Janice Paskey
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The allergy fur is flying. In an opinion column published on CBC’s national website, Gwen Smith, editor of Allergic Living magazine, refutes a Chatelaine article written by Patricia Pearson. Pearson's "It’s just nuts," first ran in the December 2009 print issue of and is now online. "In Canada, getting taken down in Chatelaine is as close as it gets to being kneecapped by Oprah," Smith contends in...
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Girls and math
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November 11, 2009 - Posted by Maija Saari
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When it comes to gender gaps in math, culture matters. That's what an economics professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology found when digging deeper into his own observations made while volunteer coaching his daughter and her friends on an all-girls math squad for their school.
Expanding the question into a larger research project, Glenn Ellison and PhD student Ashley Swanson found the best female students chosen to represent the U.S. in international math competitions came from about 20 high schools that had elite math squads.
The top boys came from about 200 schools more evenly distributed across the country.
The analysis, as outlined in MIT News Nov 4, points to the need for further research on school environments and their influence on academic acheivement.
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What's in a name? When a medical journal isn't
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May 27, 2009 - Posted by Maija Saari
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The medical blogosphere went a bit viral of late over two stories published in The Scientist (here and here) that a drug company paid a science publisher to create publications with titles that sound a lot like peer-reviewed journals.
Some (including this medical librarian) noted the uproar is actually a bit of a hair-split within the complicated (and perhaps compromised) slippery slope in commercial trade publishing that starts at peer-review journals and terminates at single-sponsor, targeted "educational" custom publishing.
Laika's medlib log notes that anyone seeing the publication, despite its medical advisory board and fancy sounding name, would know it for what it was -- a "throwaway" -- the insider medical term for the glossy "educational" materials distributed for free by drug companies.
This science blogger's rant on the issue neatly captures the defining features of the throwaway, as well as the frustration experienced by knowledge experts when medicine meets marketing.
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A flu by any other name
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May 1, 2009 - Posted by Maija Saari
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Reporters
covering the story of influenza A H1N1 in Canada should tread carefully
when sources start to offer nicknames other than swine flu. The World Health Organization website noted Apr 30 it is now using...
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Replacing science journalism
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March 18, 2009 - Posted by Deborah Jones
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Science journalism is in decline; science blogging is growing. The Science journal Nature looks at the issue -- with a focus on the implications for science.
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edited by edited by Candace Gibson and Maija Saari
This J-Topic aims to provide a better understanding of how scientists and journalists work together. It includes abstracts, columns and resource links in three main areas. First is a collection of resources generated by the scientific community in an effort to make their world easier for non-specialists to navigate. Second, the section will survey and abstract peer-reviewed articles that challenge the way journalists and scientists work. Finally, we will link to the latest coverage about hot topics in science, providing a source for story ideas or fresh angles.
This section highlights efforts by scientists to reach the broader public, analyzes critiques of journalism by scientists and offers tools and suggestions to help journalists cover these areas with greater ease and confidence.
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During "climategate" some of the declarations made under prominent bylines demonstrated professional negligence, writes 