Recently early career researchers from around Queensland gathered to share their stories and celebrate the 2018 Queensland Fresh Scientists. Dr Claudio Pizzolato from our School of Allied Health Science was one of the eleven winners of the national competition, which is a program that takes up-and-coming researchers with no media experience and turns them into spokespeople for science.
The winners undertake a day of media and communications training, which then leads to a public science night where they join a crowd of science enthusiasts to share their stories. Speaking about the experience Dr Pizzolato said, “Before the competition we underwent a full day of media training. We learnt what journalists and media expect from scientists when covering a story and practised television and radio interview techniques. For the final competition I had to synthesise 6 years of research in a single minute, avoiding jargon and trying to get my message out. It was fun, but definitely not easy! Overall, Fresh Science has been a great learning experience and made me reflect on how important the ability to communicate my research to people outside my field and to the general public is.”
Recognising the need for a symbiotic relationship between research and communications in order to reach a larger audience in the ever-evolving realm of research, opportunities like this are of growing importance and we’re proud of Dr Pizzolato’s accomplishments.
