Promoting Science Literacy and Awareness across the Globe: the Role of Scientists as Science Ambassadors

The paper addresses how to effectively promote science literacy and public awareness globally, emphasizing the role of scientists—particularly early-career scientists—as science ambassadors who engage diverse, nonscientific audiences. It outlines the context and importance of improving science literacy amidst challenges such as cultural, religious, and political polarization, misinformation, limited accessibility to reliable information, and language barriers. The authors propose the "ambassador approach"—two-way dialogue between scientists and the public outside traditional educational settings—as a promising strategy. They frame their discussion around the American Society for Microbiology (ASM) Ambassador Program and comparable initiatives, aiming to highlight benefits, challenges, and potential improvements in implementing ambassador-based outreach for science literacy.

The article synthesizes literature calling for increased scientist-public engagement and education to bolster science literacy, noting broad endorsements from surveys of scientists and policy analyses. It reviews challenges including polarization over scientific issues, the spread of misinformation, and inequities in access and inclusion. The authors cite scholarship criticizing one-way, deficit-model communication and advocate for dialogic, two-way engagement that builds trust and recognizes cultural identities and values. The literature underscores the importance of communication training for scientists, incorporation of public communication into undergraduate and graduate curricula, and use of pedagogical frameworks (e.g., backward design) to set objectives and assess outcomes. The review references multilingual communication needs, inclusive engagement for marginalized groups, and documented outcomes from programs like STEMAP demonstrating benefits of the ambassador approach for both scientists and communities.

- Ambassador programs can effectively localize and contextualize science outreach. The ASM Ambassador Program (as of 2022) spans 112 countries and 33 U.S. states, creating a global network that supports localized engagement and awareness activities. - Two-way, ambassador-style engagement is favored over the deficit model. Evidence from STEMAP and related literature indicates positive reception and benefits to both scientists and community groups when dialogue-based approaches are employed. - Early-career scientists are strategic actors: they connect well with younger audiences and are active in online spaces, expanding reach via social media and virtual events. - Examples of impactful activities include: translation and training initiatives (e.g., DivulgaMicro in Brazil, which has trained hundreds in science communication and translated ASM resources); community-based health dialogues (e.g., outreach in Maroua, Cameroon on hygiene practices); virtual adaptations during COVID-19 (e.g., DivulgaMicro’s 3-day, 8 h/day online workshop; Latin American social media campaigns); targeted webinars (e.g., Houston COVID-19 webinar series with experts and versions tailored to high school students); citizen science (e.g., K-TESST for soil and water quality in Tennessee); and hands-on youth outreach (e.g., "Bacteria Grub at the Library"). - The COVID-19 pandemic both increased public interest in microbiology and amplified misinformation, necessitating rapid shifts to virtual outreach. This improved accessibility for some regions while highlighting digital access disparities in others. - Other scientific societies (ASCB, ACS, SDB, FASEB, GSA, AAAS) provide grants, training, fellowships, and ambassador programs (e.g., AAAS IF/THEN, STEMAP) that demonstrate scalable models and provide data on outcomes. - Program design guidance includes using backward design to set learning objectives and assessments, providing formal communication training, ensuring inclusivity and multilingual resources, and moving beyond one-way dissemination. - There is a recognized need for better evaluation protocols, common keywords, and more published assessments to measure short- and long-term impacts of outreach programs.

The findings and examples support the central proposition that ambassador-style, two-way engagement by scientists can improve science literacy by building trust, addressing local contexts, and fostering dialogue rather than relying on one-way information transfer. ASM’s global network illustrates how locally embedded ambassadors can navigate cultural, religious, political, and linguistic nuances to enhance acceptance and effectiveness. The COVID-19 experience underscores both the opportunity to meet heightened public interest and the challenge of combating rapidly evolving misinformation, highlighting the importance of adaptable, audience-tailored outreach and digital tools. The discussion emphasizes that training in communication and pedagogy, explicit goal-setting via backward design, and inclusive, multilingual approaches are crucial for impactful outreach. It also stresses the need for standardized evaluation and published assessments to refine best practices and guide resource allocation, thereby enhancing the relevance and reproducibility of ambassador programs across disciplines and regions.

The paper advocates for broader adoption and support of science ambassador programs as effective vehicles to promote global science literacy and public engagement. Drawing on ASM’s extensive Ambassador Program and Young Leaders Circle activities and comparable initiatives in other societies, the authors argue that dialogic, culturally attuned outreach can bridge language and socio-cultural barriers, counter misinformation, and connect scientists with diverse publics. They recommend integrating communication training, objective-driven program design, inclusive practices, and systematic evaluation to optimize outcomes. Future work should focus on developing robust assessment frameworks, publishing evaluations to consolidate best practices, and expanding institutional and societal support to scale ambassador programs worldwide.

The article is a perspective rather than an empirical study; data assessing the impact of specific programs are limited. Outreach outcome literature is dispersed across fields, complicating synthesis. Many programs emphasize content knowledge while under-addressing competencies like evaluating expertise and information reliability. There are challenges in measuring long-term impacts and establishing standardized evaluation protocols. Pandemic-driven shifts exposed digital access inequities that may limit generalizability of virtual outreach successes. Cultural, political, and socioeconomic factors can constrain adoption of recommended practices (e.g., hygiene measures limited by poverty).