1. An Undergraduate Citizen Science Research Experience: Using Technology to Monitor Japanese Beetle Populations Across New York State The Beetle Project
Nikki Shrimpton, Dean, Central New York Center
Linda S. Jones, Assistant Professor/Mentor Sadie Ross, Director of Sustainability Jeremy Stone, Instructional Technologist
Project funded by a USDA—NIFA—Higher Education Challenge (HEC) Grant (2011—2014) and a SUNY Innovative Instruction Technology Grant (IITG) (2012—2013).

2. What is Citizen Science?
It can take various forms, perhaps most commonly:
Citizen Scientists can collect data that is then analyzed by professional researchers
Citizen Scientists can help analyze the data collected by professional researchers
The earliest Citizen Science projects focused on collecting data. The Audubon Christmas Bird Count, for examples dates back to The analysis of data has become more common as members of the general public have had more access to computers that can process large amounts of information. Zooniverse projects are examples of this latter classification.

5. Why Citizen Science for Sustainability?
Students become familiar with nature and engage in learning about the natural world
Biophilia
Understanding of systems science
Students participate in the type of scientific research that is essential to understanding the complex environmental issues in sustainability.
Students engage in their community
Civic leadership and participation
STEM recruitment and retention through place based learning that engages the student in interesting subject matter.

6. End with another tool that combines all the active learning approaches discussed above. New citizen science project from Cornell Lab.

7. Huntington Camp ADK residency site
Built on Google Maps. Has great resources associated with it.
Huntington Camp ADK residency site

10. Robust social networking capabilities
Robust social networking capabilities. Can do predictive activities and also explore other parts of the world.

11. SquirrelMapper: Development of an Informal Evolution Education Opportunity for the Urban and Rural Public
Historical records indicate that the black morph form of gray squirrels was much more prevalent than the gray morph until the late 1800s (Schorger 1949). Over time, there has been a diminution of the black morph from the rural portion of the larger landscape with pockets of black squirrels remaining (or recovering) in urban areas. What happened?
Various hypotheses for why this occurred – old growth vs. secondary growth, hunting pressure, road mortality

14. Japanesebeetles.esc.edu

15. Japanese Beetles—Why? Multi-dimensional, Interdisciplinary Species
Climate, Soils, Vegetation, Ecosystems
Economics, Policy, History
Japanese beetle life cycle—illustrated by APHIS employee Joel Floyd,
The soil from each sample point is searched for Japanese beetle grubs and eggs—Kohen Joiner, ENVS, Summer 2012

16. The Beetle Project
Students collect data related to climate, soils, and the Japanese beetle life cycle
Students contribute their data to an online science community
Photo of plot 1 taken just before sampling—Jennifer Stalter, ENVS, Fall 2011.
Map of Plot 1—Jennifer Stalter, ENVS, Fall 2011

17. Climate Literacy Earth’s dynamic climate
Define climate before discussing change
Connect climate characteristics & species adaptations
Dynamic processes influencing climate change
History of the Earth’s changing climate
Combination of physical, biological, and chemical processes
How climate is changing/predicted to change in the local environment
Figure accessed at
Marcell and DeGaetano 2007.

18. Customize your own informational pages

19. Project Context: STEM and Citizen Science
STEM Education
Increase student interest in and understanding of the environment around them
Provide students with field experiences with related to their personal life
Oops, I just did scientific research
Citizen Science
Promote a sense of community
On or off campus. Send them into the town to check out the ball fields.
Begin discussion of brainstorming to come up with a project idea—how do these projects come to be—will follow up this discussion in final working session—move into discussion of the Beetle project specifically.

20. Making your own citizen science project
Citizenscience.esc.edu

21. Resource for other projects

22. Or make your own

23. Decide your own data to enter

24. Customize your own informational pages

25. Create your own map

26. Coming Soon in Drupal 7
The next version in built in Drupal 7 and has a lot of new and exciting features. It allows for different icons, circle, polygon, polyline, and rectangle overlays, etc. You no longer need to know the coordinates of a location, this version you can just click and save the point.