Workshop leaders for the science writing internship

We've got an amazing line-up of scientists, science communicators and science journalists for our 2021 Science Writing Internship!

Our workshop leaders will be giving public seminars that will be free and open to all! Most events will be 12 to 1 pm EST, though this may vary slightly between speakers. We'll be posting information about how to access these events (or recordings of them) soon.

Cylita Guy: Science Communication 101 (June 5)

Dr. Cylita Guy is a Toronto based ecologist, data scientist, and science communicator. She completed her PhD at the University of Toronto where she studied bats as carriers of viruses. After completing an Insight Data Science Fellowship, Dr. Guy now works as a data scientist at Assurance IQ. An experienced science communicator, Dr. Guy spent ten years working as a Host at the Ontario Science Centre. She has also appeared on T.V. and radio, had her writing featured in several outlets (including the book Fieldwork Fail: The Messy Side of Science), started a children’s community science program in High Park, and is one of the founding members of Canada’s first science communication conference for graduate students (ComSciCon-CAN!). Dr. Guy’s first children’s book – Chasing Bats & Tracking Rats: Urban Ecology, Community Science, and How We Share Our Cities – published by Annick Press, is now available for pre-order. In her spare time, you can find your friendly neighbourhood batgirl chasing her next big outdoor adventure.

Terry McGlynn: Science Blogging (June 10)

Dr. Terry McGlynn is an ecologist, entomologist, and science communicator. He is a Professor of Biology at California State University Dominguez Hills, and this summer he assumes the directorship of the CSU Desert Studies Consortium. His research employs experimental natural history to solve mysteries involving the integrative biology of ants, mostly in rainforests but also in cities and in deserts, leading to over 50 peer-reviewed publications.

To increase the accessibility of evidence-based teaching practices, he wrote The Chicago Guide to College Science Teaching (University of Chicago Press, 2020), which is notable for its emphasis on kind and equitable teaching. McGlynn has led several NSF-funded projects that supported international research opportunities and mentorship for undergraduates, and has served as the Director of Undergraduate Research at his university. Dr. McGlynn shares his expertise via service on editorial boards and grant review panels, and is a 2021 Fellow of the Earth Leadership Program. In 2021, he received his university's annual Presidential Outstanding Professor award.

He is the creator of the popular science community blog Small Pond Science, which has accumulated over 2 million page views, and has a wide readership on his Twitter account, @hormiga, and periodically contributes to the Chronicle of Higher Education. Dr. McGlynn is a strong voice for equity and broadening participation in STEM, and works to build greater understanding of institutions that serve minoritized and first-generation students.

Ryan Imgrund: Misinformation (June 24)

Ryan Imgrund is a biostatistician, science communicator, and corporate consultant. He works with Vector Health Labs, a Toronto-based, provincially licensed lab specializing in keeping businesses open during COVID-19 by focusing on testing, surveillance, countermeasures, and data analytics. Ryan also works with Google and Magna International as a corporate consultant, as well as with several Ontario Public Health Units including Ottawa, Peel, and Six Nations Health Services. There, his work centres around better communicating data to the general public.

As a science communicator, Ryan’s social media work is focused on Twitter (@imgrund) where he amassed nearly 70,000 followers. On this platform, he analyzes and breaks down trends in Ontario’s daily COVID-19 numbers.

Ryan's experience with COVID-19 began in March 2020 when working as a biostatistician with Southlake Regional Health Centre in Newmarket, Ontario. His role was to generate a model that could be used to predict future ICU utilization and ventilator use specific to COVID-19. It was during this time that he developed expertise in the area of effective reproduction number calculations - values he posts to his Twitter account on a daily basis.

Ryan’s role in public health first began in the early 2000's with the Public Health Agency of Canada where he worked out of the Laboratory for Foodborne Zoonoses. There, he specialized in antimicrobial resistance and diagnostic microbiology, pertaining to Campylobacter spp. and E. coli O157 : H7.

Siri Carpenter: Science Journalism and Pitching (June 30)

Siri Carpenter is an award-winning science journalist and editor whose writing and editorial work has appeared in The New York Times, Science, Discover, Scientific American, bioGraphic, Science News, Science News for Students, Slate, Prevention, O Magazine, and many other publications. She was a features editor at Discover magazine from 2012 to 2014, and has worked as a contract editor for numerous publications, most regularly for Science News for Students.

Carpenter is co-founder and editor-in-chief of The Open Notebook, a non-profit organization that helps science journalists improve their skills, and she is the editor of The Craft of Science Writing, published by The Open Notebook in 2020.

She is also first author of the psychology textbook Visualizing Psychology, published by Wiley in 2008. She has been a member of the National Association of Science Writers since 1998 and was president of NASW from 2018-2020. She has a Ph.D. in psychology from Yale University and lives in Madison, Wisconsin. She tweets @SiriCarpenter.

(Information about our other workshop leaders coming soon!)