Collaborating on a Research Team
NEST researchers at the all-team meeting in Freeport, ME in October 2014.
Building Knowledge
Working together as researchers with the interests of the public and other partners in mind can be challenging. Part of the challenge comes from balancing the many interests that different people and groups have and trying to make those differences productive in creating solutions through sustainability science.
Since NEST is a large team spread across two states and several colleges and universities, researchers on the Safe Beaches and Shellfish project regularly meet in order to make coordinated progress toward proposing solutions. Focused teams meet on a weekly or monthly basis to share progress and identify areas where they can assist each other, but in order for the larger team to continue to work together effectively, larger meetings happen a few times a year.
NEST has coordinated all-team meetings several times. During one meeting on October 31, 2014 in Freeport, ME, researchers across both states came together in a shared space to present research findings, brainstorm ideas for future work, and scope the possibilities of collaborating further. Darren Ranco, associate professor of Anthropology at the University of Maine, said "this is a large project with large goals. We're coming together to make sure that there's good communication, good integration around the research, in that we're actually creating research that is different and will actually have the stated impacts of the project."
Dr. Steve Jones, University of New Hampshire
Dr. Darren Ranco, University of Maine