Issue Guides

“Creating dialogues, classroom spaces and community-engaged Civic Science programs that connect student’s identities to their science learning”

From Concern Gatherings to Public Forums

Public engagement in science forums are grounded in issue guides, developed in collaboration with the Kettering Foundation, that guide dialogue and deliberation on divisive and complex science issues. These issue guides are based on information gathered from concerns gathered from scientists and citizens. Here are examples of issue guides from recent forums prepared by Tufts students in the class Science and Civic Action 2021 on the following topics:

Issue Guides for Public Engagement on the COVID-19 Pandemic

The global COVID-19 pandemic has revealed pervasive health inequities as seen by the disproportionate impact of this disease on communities of color. Our Civic Science course “Science and Civic Action” taught students skills and sensibilities to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic through an equity lens.

Students created five issue guides that offer the public might apply science information on COVID-19 to use in their daily lives. They used these guides to host online forums where members of the public discussed personal and societal consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic. Issue Guides were created by students on five critical areas of the COVID-19 crisis:

  1. The disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on communities of color
  2. COVID-19 and vaccine nationalism
  3. COVID-19 and food insecurity
  4. COVID-19 and vaccine hesitancy
  5. COVID-19 testing and contact tracing