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The multidisiciplinary Master’s Degree Program in Scientific and Cultural Communication (MDCC) began in the first semester of 2007. It is offered by the Laboratory of Advanced Studies in Journalism (Labjor) of the Creativity Development Nucleus (NUDECRI) and by the Institute of Language Studies (IEL), both of which are entities the State University of Campinas (UNICAMP). The program is also supported by the Department of Scientific and Technological Policy (DPCT) of the Geosciences Institute (IG) and by MediaTec – Media and Communication Technologies Laboratory of the Multimedia Department (DMM) of the Art Institute (IA). The objective of the MDCC is to train and enable researchers with in-depth theoretical knowledge about current questions related to science communication. A global vision of the systems of science and technology are joined together with an understanding of a solid, contemporary literary and cultural repertoire. The interaction among subjects offered in the MDCC seeks to provide an education that allows critical reflection about the main accomplishments of science, technology and culture in our current society and the way in which the mass or specialized media have worked in order to communicate these accomplishments. The areas of research focus on the analysis of cultural production and science communication within the most diverse means of information, such as print, radio, television and electronic media. There is a special emphasis on areas such as science and technical history and the sociology of science, as well as other spaces of science and cultural communication, such as museums, forums and events.

Science, politics, industry, media, state-run and private organisations, private citizens: everyone has their own demands, their own heritage of knowledge, thoughts, opinions, aspirations, needs. Different worlds that interact, question one another, discuss; in one word: they communicate. It is a complicated process that requires professionals «who clearly understand the key aspects of the transmission of scientific knowledge to society through the different essential communication channels for multiple organizations». The purpose of this commentary is to cast some light upon the goals, the philosophy and the organisation behind some European and extra-European Master’s degrees in science communication. We have asked the directors of each of them to describe their founding elements, their origins, their specific features, their structure, their goals, the reasons why they were established and the evolution they have seen over their history.

Within the UNAM (The National Autonomous University of Mexico) there is an institution, the Dirección General de Divulgación de la Ciencia (DGDC) devoted to the popularization of science through different media such as museums, exhibitions, journals, books, radio and TV programs, internet, workshops for children, demos, shows, plays, summer courses and outreach programs. Most of these products and materials are planned, designed and manufactured by a multidisciplinary team of professionals in the DGDC. Some of our most outstanding projects are: the creation and operation of two science museums, UNIVERSUM (on the university campus), and the Museo de la Luz (Museum of Light) in the center of the city, many temporary and traveling exhibitions, museums in other parts of the country and abroad and a monthly publication for young readers called ¿Cómo ves?

A recent article published in Science Communication addresses the training issue in issue in our discipline. Henk Mulder and his colleagues discuss the shared features that university curricula should or could have to favour the full admission of science communication into the academic circle. Having analysed analogies and differences in the curricula that a number of schools provide all over the world, the authors reached the conclusion that much remains to be done. Science communication seems far from having found shared fundamental references, lessons that cannot be missed in the practical-theoretical education of future professionals or researchers in this discipline. What should one study to become a good science communicator? And to make innovative research?

The Masters (MSc) in Science Communication at Dublin City University (Ireland)
draws on expertise from several disciplines in human and physical sciences.
The programme takes a broad view of communication that includes the various
kinds of interaction between institutions of science and of society, as well
as the diverse means of exchanging information and ideas. Nearly 200 students
from a wide variety of backgrounds have completed the programme since its
start in 1996, and they work in many different types of employment, from
information and outreach services, to science centres, to publishing and
journalism. Through the programme, and in the dissertation in particular,
students are encouraged to reflect critically on the place and performance
of science in society, and on relations between the cultures of natural sciences
and of humanities and social sciences.

The Internet is by far the most intensely used communication tool of today and the main channel of interaction in the globalized world. This technology has opened up a whole new area for the interaction of knowledge: cyberspace, where information is always present and continuously changing. The interactivity that characterizes the virtual media together with the interactive modules developed by science centers and museums make the Internet a whole new space for the popularization of science. In order to stimulate dialog between science and society, Espaço Ciência Viva has decided to employ the Internet to divulge and to popularize scientific knowledge by bringing debates about the advances of science to the daily lives of people. To this end, its website was remodeled, which led to an increase of up to 600% in the number of visitors.

Public communication of sciences is of strategic relevance in the transition from the industrial society to the knowledge society. The Master’s Course in Scientific, Medical and Environmental Communication of Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona (Spain) responds to this economic, social and cultural need. The result: professionals who clearly understand the key aspects of the transmission of scientific knowledge to society through the different essential communication channels in multiple organizations as, among others, mass media, institutional and public relations and museums. This initiative collaborates also to build informed and educated citizens, who understand, accompany and are able to participate in the necessary and unavoidable adaptation to this new society.

There is a compelling need to ensure that the points of view and preferences of stakeholders are fully considered and incorporated into natural resources management strategies. Stakeholders include a diverse group of individuals in several sectors that have an interest in how natural resources are managed. Typically, stakeholders with an interest in groundwater resources include groups who could be affected by the manner in which the resource is managed (e.g., farmers who need water for irrigation; municipalities and individuals who need drinking water, agencies and organizations that want to maintain in-stream flows to support ecosystems, etc.) Refugio County in South Texas provides an interesting case study since several groups of water users in the region are working with researchers at Texas A&M University-Kingsville (TAMUK) to develop decision-support models that incorporate stakeholder concerns. The focus of this paper is to provide a series of arguments and approaches about the ways in which stakeholder issues have recently been incorporated into environmental models, to briefly describe some of the TAMUK efforts to develop groundwater models that incorporate stakeholder inputs, and to present and discuss a method in which communication research can be used to obtain stakeholder preferences input into modeling efforts.

Mouse-related research in the life sciences has expanded remarkably over the last two decades, resulting in growing use of the term “mouse model”. Our interviews with 64 leading Japanese life sciences researchers showed heterogeneities in the definition of “mouse model” in the Japanese life sciences community. Here, we discuss the implications for the relationship between the life sciences community and society in Japan that may result from this ambiguity in the terminology. It is suggested that, in Japanese life sciences, efforts by individual researchers to make their scientific information unambiguous and explanative are necessary.

The Science House of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ) is a space where science is approached through the perspective of culture, seeking interdisciplinarity, stimulating debate among different areas of knowledge, and building a closer and more pleasant relationship between society and scientific knowledge.  Work with mediators has gone through significant changes over time and the paths chosen have been modified, re-evaluated and transformed.  The presence of mediators can mean the possibility of dialog, conversation, informal chat, and sharing.  It has been one of the main channels of communication with the general public.