Who knows what’s in your air, water, and soil? Who can tell you what’s in your food? Who is conducting the research to predict the effects of climate change? Federal scientists funded by Canadian tax dollars are among those generating evidence relevant to public health and safety. This information is crucial to monitoring the health of your body, your community, and your environment. They have been doing this work for decades, amassing large quantities of data in archives and libraries. Their research can give us a long view of social and environmental change.
Monitoring is essential as a first step in defining problems that affect us now and in the future. Researchers and community members should be able to build on this data, working with policy makers, change makers, and industry to make informed decisions.
We want to see members of the public engage with public science. So we built a platform to facilitate just such a form of participatory democracy.
What can you do?