Driving citizen science success through academic libraries

Classifying and coding NASA’s photographs of Mars landforms opens in new tab/window. Contributing to neuroscience models that map the unique differences in human perceptive experience opens in new tab/window. Deciphering and digitizing the messy handwritten notes opens in new tab/window of a famous 19th-century philosopher.  

What do these research projects have in common? Each involved members of the public contributing their time, skills, or resources to the research process, through initiatives broadly known as citizen science.

Over the last 20 years citizen science has grown as a way for researchers to partner with the public in studies ranging from ecology to urban planning, environmental monitoring to public health. Together these initiatives build research capacity, support open science, and increase public science literacy.  

While public libraries are often associated with citizen science and childhood education, academic libraries have traditionally been less involved. But these libraries can offer both subject and process expertise to help their institutions manage a successful citizen science program.  

We sat down with a co-chair of the Association of European Research Libraries opens in new tab/window (LIBER) Working Group on Citizen Science opens in new tab/window and three librarians from University of Tartu in Estonia to talk about their efforts to develop citizen science services in academic libraries. All are involved in the LibOCS opens in new tab/window project, EU-funded research into best practices and strategies for libraries to support public research participation at their institutions.

Why should academic libraries get involved with citizen science?  

Public trust 

Tiberius Ignat: “In societies, libraries consistently top lists of trusted institutions. Sometimes when people don't trust science, they still trust libraries - this trust is not easy to acquire, so it is something that libraries can build on.”

Central overview 

Academic libraries already occupy a central position for research support in academic institutions. Tiberius added: “The League of European Research Universities (LERU) published opens in new tab/window some recommendations for implementing citizen science in universities in 2016. One of the recommendations was to create a single point of contact for citizen science within the institution. We published a prototype in 2020 to support the implementation of that recommendation. It’s called BESPOC (Broad Engagement in Science, Point of Contact” and it’s free to use.

Expertise 

Tiberius: “Librarians work closely for years with scientists, so this creates a particularly good starting point, knowing the scientific process. Librarians also understand about organizing [research] protocols in a way that is participatory-friendly. A good citizen science culture in a university needs support, and libraries can help support this culture by designing good services."

It sounds like there’s lot of network and relationship value gained by developing these services? 

Liisi: “We put ourselves on the map through the LibOCS project. First were three sets of roundtables with researchers, librarians and students, from all the Baltic countries (Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia). Then, the University of Latvia led a survey to gather feedback from both memory institutions and researchers. Finally, using the BESPOC model, we consulted with researchers already involved in citizen science to explore how we could set up citizen science support in our universities. 

An interesting part of the consultations was that researchers found out about other researchers who were also doing citizen science. They had no idea that, ‘OK, there are other people like me’ struggling with building their project and getting people involved. 

Tallinn University of Technology also contributed, in addition to the other Baltic university partners, and we are also starting to do events with our main funder, the Estonian Research Council. They want to establish a real network among universities.”

What are the biggest challenges you faced in building support for citizen science? 

Attitude 

Liisi: “We found different attitudes in countries that are way ahead of us, like Austria. Researchers there seem to be concerned with proving the value of what they do to the public, while here, at least in Estonia, the attitude is more that academia is in another sphere.” 

Country size and language 

Liisi: “Estonia is small (pop. 1.3 million). If you have tons of people, you can post a project, and you'll end up with a thousand participants because you know that somebody is interested in your topic. Language also makes it challenging - most of science or research is done in English, but if you want to involve Estonians, then that requires the Estonian language.” 

Tiberius: “Citizen science is not falling from a blue sky just because a researcher or a group of researchers want to engage with a broader public. It's incredibly hard to engage with the population, to recruit and train them, maintain their work and interest, and do this consistently. You have to have a strategy in place and adapt it continuously.” 

What else did you learn in the process? 

Svea: “We don’t always agree on what can be considered citizen science, especially when dealing with different countries. You learn how to agree to disagree. Also, we had a big learning curve when we started giving face-to-face trainings for other librarians already within the first year.”  

Liisi: “When using the BESPOC model, you have to consider both practical steps and various aspects, as it includes nine modules. This approach really makes you think about everything that’s involved. Otherwise, you might say, ‘oh I’ll just write up the project and ask some volunteers to do something,’ but there are many other aspects you need to think about.” 

She adds that learning how to run such a large project was eye-opening. “This was my first time leading [an EU project] – we were the leading partner. If we look at the milestones we had written, when we first saw it, we thought ‘there’s no way we can do it all.’ And in the end, we did it all and even more. To know what libraries can do if they put their mind to it is just amazing.”

What should libraries consider when creating support services for citizen science? 

Svea recommends starting with an existing model or toolkit. “On the LibOCS website, we did this toolkit. It says that it's for librarians, but it would also be a great resource for volunteers or scientists who are just starting out with this topic, to familiarize themselves with it.” 

With the foundation you’ve built, what are you planning to do next? 

Liisi: “We are also running the Estonia open science website for the entire country. Our goal is to have a central place where if you’re a researcher you can know what other researchers are doing, or if you're a citizen and want to be involved, this is one place that you can go. We are also planning a citizen science day with the Estonian Research Council to increase public attention to what our researchers are doing.” 

Lilian: "We plan to map the citizen science projects happening in our university. And we would also like to start with our own citizen science project in our library - a transcription project for digitizing handwritten records.” Liisi adds, “we hope that we can do this project from beginning to end and see how our model fits, and what it’s like to involve the public.”