Incorporating Community and Citizen Science into Schools: How Youth Develop Science Identity in California Forests

Abstract

Community and citizen science show promising outcomes of democratizing scientific endeavors by engaging non-professionals in scientific research. Thus we incorporated this program model into elementary schools to support youths'' science learning. Informed by multiple threads of scholarly works - situated learning, figured worlds, and place-based learning, we collaborated with teachers and community stakeholders to design and implement a forest monitoring protocol to study fire behavior and invasive species in a local Northern California forest. After analyzing 15 youths' post-program interviews, we found that youth-focused community and citizen science have great potential to support youths' development of scientific knowledge, practice, and identity. Using authentic scientific tools and collecting place-based data not only supports youths' disciplinary practice learning but also mediates their science identity development by broadening what counts as science and how and where science is executed.