Last fall the co-author of my first book [1] and I were walking through a botanic garden in New Brunswick where he serves as board president (as an entomologist, you should note). We were working our way down a slightly slippery, wet slope in a thick forest, delighting in abundant, varied fungi, when Steve asked me:
"Do you consider yourself an ecologist?"
I was stumped (no pun intended, but oh, the joys of puns!).
I'd never actually considered that question. I prevaricated: I don't officially have any science degrees. I certainly don't have any ecology degrees. I definitely don't have a PhD (just ask all the administrators who still care!).
But, as Steve reminded me, I've worked in and adjacent to science my entire career. I can write and edit papers as well as anyone, and though I don't formally supervise "my own" grad students, I advise and mentor many in ways that help them persist and become inclusive, ethical scientists. I know what we're talking about when most ecological discussions come up, and can engage in them productively. I can contribute meaningfully to discussions of a range of quantitative (to a point!) and qualitative methods. I can give useful, accurate advice about navigating a lot of the career decisions made by students and early and mid-career scientists. I have a publication record that far exceeds the expectations of my job description and the requirements for me to get tenure in my department (if I were on the tenure track). And, I've actually done a fair amount of ecology field work in my day! I was recently awarded a major honor from the Ecological Society of America, for my scholarship and work as an active member of their organization for the past decade. And, I'm the lead researcher on a $1-million grant funded by NSF in August, and I've raised several million dollars (with collaborators) to do science and scicomm.
Eventually, Steve and I worked our way to the conclusion that I am definitely a scientist, while not necessarily an ecologist (though not absolutely not one, either).
This conversation flickered in my memory when I read a blog post a while back that asked "what non-science activities made you a better scientist."
I did not respond to that post in their comments section. But I pondered the question for a while.
Here's how I'd answer that question now.
I'm going to say that the thing that made me a better scientist was spending most of my life as not-a-scientist. By which I actually do not mean don't be a workaholic or try to achieve some work-life harmony. (Although, of course, that's important, too.)
What I mean is that I spent most of my career (a) not in academia and (b) at the interstices between science-being-done and science-being-used.
The following is a non-exhaustive list of that liminal space where my career has happened:
I worked in stream science educational programs; ran an urban sustainability nonprofit's suite of adult and youth programming; was a facilitator and board member for several community development initiatives relating to poverty, access to food, and community vitality.
I was a freelance writer and illustrator working with scientists and making content about science.
I had a regular science/sustainability beat in a minority language newspaper.
I edited scientific manuscripts for scientists writing in English as an additional language.
I consulted on urban gardens and sustainability fundraising; and ran adult literacy and continuing education programs in a French-language city.
I taught freshman English (and loved it); co-developed a major art-science symposium and teacher training institute; did a lot of social media and outreach work for a big research group.
I taught grad students and undergrads how to effectively share science beyond the academy.
I co-led our university's most recent strategic planning process.
I launched multiple businesses, started a podcast, and built three major scicomm initiatives from scratch with amazing collaborators.
Somewhere in all that, I got hooked on the question of whether anything we were doing was working.
As I've said before, the question of whether this work matters is, to me, a given. I don't wait around for permission or validation of this work.
But, are the methods we've used over the past 20 years effective in cataloging and coaching people to become effective, ethical, inclusive, and sustainable at co-produced approaches to science, sustainability, and scicomm?
Are any of these efforts opening the door wider to people -- like me -- who never imagined (or even recognized) that academia or any kind of scholarly career was an option?
And, are we continually ensuring the way we run our programs and organizations is supportive of everyone we work with?
Those are questions that can be answered scientifically, which is a big focus in my work these days. I never would have known to ask those questions, though, if I hadn't spent a lot of my career doing things that a narrow-box framing of science would say are non-science.
Certainly, when that blog asked what non-science activities helped make me a better science, I could have said cooking, gardening, illustration, pottery, poetry, walking my dog, and so on. For many reasons that folks elaborated on in the comments of that original blog post. And those would all have relevance and be true answers for my life and career progression (ever deeper into science).
But, the honest truth is that getting all my formal (and a lot of my informal and on-the-job) training outside STEM is what set me up to be a better scientist. Seeing how science got "made" made me a better scientist. But more so, seeing how science needed to be made to be effectively and ethically shared if it was ever going to be used made me a better scientist.
This is not a conversation we have with students and early career folks. We rarely even suggest to trainees that they pursue work or study in other disciplines. But we need to encourage (and have!) wide-ranging, robust training way beyond STEM. We're closing a lot of doors by keeping training and career experience in this corner. The overly honest truth is that I doubt I would have become the scientist I am if I had merely trained in science and done science [2].
How about you?
What's an aspect of your formal or informal training or life experience that seems to have nothing to do with your profession that has made you better at what you do?
NOTES
[1] Well, technically, it's my second book project if we're talking writing/editing. It's my fourth book project overall. And, I do not expect it to be my last! Weeeee! 🤗 But, technically, it's the first book that I've led the writing on.
[2] The fact is that I actually did train in science (and quit science!) several times in my career. That's pertinent, but a story for another time.
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