The
93rd annual meeting of the American Meteorological Society (AMS) has
been going on this week in Austin, Texas.
An awards banquet was held Wednesday evening where I received the Award
for Excellence in Science Reporting by a Broadcast Meteorologist. The award was for the pioneering program
Climate Matters which began in July, 2010.
I am the seventh recipient of the award.
 |
| Climate Matters Page on the WLTX website. Image Credit: WLTX. |
Climate
Matters is a program that attempts to educate viewers about climate change and
how it is already affecting their lives.
Many of the segments are localized to the effects on South Carolina, but
may also apply to other regions. The
reports use only peer-reviewed published work of scientists involved in climate
change research.
However,
let me tell you how this came about. It
started with my own interest in climate change.
I was at a retirement party for Dr. John Carpenter who was in the
Geology Department and longtime director of the Center for Science Education at
the University of South Carolina. During
that party a couple of professors came up to me and ask if I thought climate
change was real. I told them that I
thought it was, but had not really given it much thought.
So
I thought it would be best for me to find out myself. About 2005 I began reading about climate
change. There were already a number of
books on the subject, but there were some technical details that needed
clarity. I started to read the actual
research papers in the scientific journals and tackling the questions raised by
climate deniers. It was soon obvious
from the overwhelming research that the deniers were on thin ice. Their arguments did not hold water and they
were not publishing any research.
In
2008 the economy tanked and a number of stations and news organizations began
firing their science journalists. This
left a void in the media as to who had the expertise to report on science
issues. I was aware of the station
scientist effort being promoted by the AMS, so I got involved by asking Paul
Gross, the committee chairman, to let me on the committee.
I
joined the Station Scientist committee, a subcommittee of the AMS Broadcast
Board, in 2009 along with my friend Dan Satterfield. We had talked about the situation in science
reporting and both wanted on the board.
This began my efforts to educate viewers about science and entered the
realm of science journalism. It was a
new area for me since I had spent my entire career as a broadcast meteorologist
intent on providing viewers the best weather reports I could.
Paul
received an email from Joe Witte, a broadcast meteorologist in Washington,
D.C., shortly after I got on the committee.
Joe was looking for someone from the committee to act as an advisor for
a proposal to the National Science Foundation (NSF) to use weathercasters as
climate educators. He had come up with
the idea and was working with the Center for Climate Change Communication (4C)
at George Mason University (GMU).
The
idea appealed to me and so I replied as fast as I could. What I did not realized was that the speed of
light was slower from South Carolina than it was from Alabama. Dan had beaten me to the punch. Later Joe emailed me and asked if I would
like to be a test case. Of course I said
yes.
This
began a collaborative effort between the Center for Climate Change
Communication, Climate Central in Princeton, New Jersey, and WLTX Television. The grant from the proposal was awarded in
the fall of 2009. I met with Heidi
Cullen from Climate Central along with a group working with 4C at GMU in late November. We mapped out a year-long effort to educate
the viewers in central South Carolina.
There
was a pre-survey of the market before Climate Matters began. Then the segments started in late July,
2010. The final segment in the effort
aired in mid-June, 2011. This was
followed by a post-survey of the market to see if we had achieved the aims of
the project. I am happy to report that
learning among WLTX viewers did occur and furthermore the survey showed that
WLTX viewers were more acceptant of the idea of human-caused climate change
than viewers of other television stations.
Climate
Matters was never intended to end with the end of the NSF-funded program. I have continued the effort to educate
viewers about climate change and how it is already affecting them. This has been accomplished with the generous
help of Climate Central. They have
helped supply many of the graphics I use on-air and on this blog. We often collaborate on ideas.
I
have learned a great deal since beginning this effort. All aspects of Climate Matters have improved
and I am looking forward to continuing the effort in 2013. Were there challenges along the way? Absolutely, more than you can imagine.
There
are currently two papers concerning the effort in peer-review and it is hoped
that they will be accepted and published later this year. One of the papers outlines many of the
challenges that I had to overcome and will be of interest to others who wish to
do what I did. I will keep you updated.
A
huge thanks goes out to Paul Gross of WDIV in Detroit for giving me the chance to serve on the Station Scientist
Committee. Also, a thanks to my partner
in crime, Dan Satterfield, now at in Salisbury, MD, as he listened to many of my complaints. My three years on the committee prevented me
from applying for the award, but good things come to those who wait. I am most appreciative that they judged my
entry worthy of the award. The winning
entry was Climate Change and Poison Ivy.
I will update this story with some new information in early spring 2013.
Also
the effort with George Mason University was led by Ed Maibach, who has taught me a great deal about communicating climate change. There was a significant group at GMU that
contributed to this work and many are co-authors to the papers. I especially appreciate Barry Klinger, a
physical oceanographer, who took the time to question everything we did. It was a real pleasure to work with Heidi Cullen and everyone at Climate Central. This
effort could not continue easily without them.
While
I won the award, the real winners here are the viewers who watch me every
night. They can rest assured that they
are getting the best forecasts and science information that I can deliver.
You
can see the interview I did with the AMS here.
