Abstract
The 2024 “Zebrafish in Education and Outreach Workshop” was held at the 18th International Zebrafish Conference (IZFC) in Kyoto, Japan, on August 19th. It was organized by Jennifer O. Liang of the University of Minnesota Duluth (Duluth, MN, US), with formal presentations by Jennifer Liang and Jason Meyers of Colgate University (Hamilton, NY, US), and discussion by all attendees.
Report on progress on goals set at the 2022 Zebrafish in Education workshop
The first item on the agenda for the 2024 “Zebrafish in Education and Outreach Workshop” was to review progress on goals set by the attendees of the Zebrafish in Education Workshop held at the 17th IZFC in Montreal, Canada, in 2022.
Goal 1: Add an education committee to the structure of the International Zebrafish Society (IZFS)
The IZFS Board approved the formation of an IZFS Education and Outreach Committee in 2023. The key goals of this committee are to (1) provide venues for discussion of the use of zebrafish in education and outreach programs, including at IZFS conferences, (2) provide support for development of resources for Education and Outreach, and (3) promote integration of education and outreach with research activities. The current members of the committee, which was formed after this workshop, are Jason Meyers (Chair), Jennifer Liang, Kara Ceverny (Reed College, Portland, OR, US), Carmen Gloria Feijoo (Universidad Andres Bello, Santiago, Chile), Raquel Brañas i Casas (University of Padua, Padua, Italy), and Kelly Monk (Oregon Health & Science University, Portland, OR, US). IZFS is looking for people interested in joining this committee and especially hopes to recruit members from parts of the world not currently represented.
Goal 2: Publish a special issue of Zebrafish focused on education
A special “Zebrafish in Education” issue of Zebrafish was published in April 2024. 1 This was notable as the largest education issue published in Zebrafish, with 21 articles, making it a double issue (Table 1). The publication of this special issue was led by two guest editors, Tamara Franz-Odendaal (Mount Saint Vincent University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada) and Madelyn Jackson (Washington University, St. Louis, MO, US). Importantly, Madelyn Jackson was the first early-career editor, starting the project when she was a PhD student and finishing when she was a post-doctoral fellow. Support was also provided by the education editors of Zebrafish, Lara Hutson (University at Buffalo, Buffalo, NY, US), Jennifer Liang, Michael Pickart (Concordia University Wisconsin, Mequon, WI, US), and Chris Pierret (InSciEd Out, University of Arkansas-Fort Smith). The large response to the call for submissions suggests a growing interest from the community in publishing their education scholarship. Like the other special issues on education4–6 , the articles in this special issue were made free to access by the journal’s publisher, Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., continuing their long-term support for our community.
Summary of Special Education Issues of Zebrafish
Goal 3: Start a Slack site for Zebrafish in education
There are currently several ways to share materials used for education and outreach projects, such as the special education issues of Zebrafish. However, there was a consensus that there is a need for a collaborative, easy, decentralized way for the community to share useful materials with others and to get feedback on projects that are still in development. Towards this goal, Tamara Stawicki (Lafayette College, Easton, PA, US) started a “Zebrafish in Education” site using the Slack, a collaborative workspace. The Slack site currently has several threads, including research with undergrads, example syllabi, and scientific outreach. Although this site partially fills the needs of the community, it has some limitations. For instance, content becomes inaccessible a year after it has been added to the site unless the user pays for an upgraded plan. One of the future goals is to find a way to make this Slack site freely available or to move the content into a fully accessible, free platform.
Goal 4: Establish standing sessions on zebrafish and education at IZFC meetings
Another need of the community using zebrafish in education and outreach is a regular place to meet, set goals, and report progress. The creation of the IZFS creates an opportunity to develop a centralized place to organize the efforts of this community. There are several ideas of how to integrate efforts with the IZFS. For instance, there was strong support to make “Education and Community Outreach” a topic for abstracts at every IZFC meeting, including a session of the meeting devoted to talks on this topic. This goal is still in the planning stages.
Future goals (next 2–3 years)
The second item on the agenda for the workshop was an open discussion on the most urgent needs of the zebrafish education community. This discussion was wide-ranging, reflecting the many ways that zebrafish have been used to promote learning and community engagement. There were several needs that came to the forefront.
Goal 1: Create sustainable and inclusive support for education and outreach efforts
Recruit members for the new IZFS Zebrafish in Education and Outreach Committee representing all areas of the world. This goal is very intertwined with the goal of having regular inclusion of education topics and workshops at every IZFC meeting, as this will ensure that scientists-educators from all over the world have an opportunity to hear about initiatives and resources.
Goal 2: Create a decentralized place for sharing ideas and materials
The goal of making an easily accessible place to share resources for education and community outreach still has some challenges. Although the current “Zebrafish in Education” slack site is working well, material moves behind a paywall after one year. Several, non-exclusive, solutions were discussed. At the first meeting of the IZFS Education and Outreach Committee, one of these ideas, moving the content to the “Zebrafish Rock!” Slack site 2 was chosen as the first idea to pursue. Since “Zebrafish Rock!” is financially supported by the Zebrafish Information Network, 3 its content is freely and widely available.
Footnotes
Acknowledgments
Thank you to the many people who have contributed to their ideas for using zebrafish to improve education and to make connections with our communities.
Disclosure Statement
No competing financial interests exist.