For many of the students, it was the first time they had worn a press pass or attended a press conference.

For most of those studying journalism, it was the first time they had attended a scientific meeting.

And for the vast majority, it was one of the few times they had filed a story outside of class within hours of attending an event.

The result for the J554 Science Writing students who attended the 173rd annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in San Francisco last month was sudden immersion into the world of professional science writing.

Under the guidance of journalism professor Holly Stocking and with financial support from the School of Journalism, 10 graduate students covered one of the world’s most well known science meetings.

Students had three assignments during their two and a half days at the multi-disciplinary meeting. They had to write a science short and one to two other stories based on the meeting, which more than 8,100 scientists, journalists and public information professionals attended.

The assignments led students to collar scientists for interviews and cover events from 33 press briefings and nearly 200 symposia and lectures on everything from robotics, climate change and nuclear energy to the neurobiology of chocolate, hearing loss, science literacy and possible collisions of asteroids with the earth.

Stocking said AAAS is one of the most widely covered scientific meetings in the world, in part because prominent scientists present their research to other scientists not in their own disciplines. She said this means they’re less likely to lard their talks with jargon; they also are more likely to discuss the policy implications of their work.

Pros at work
Because the meeting attracts so many media, students observed journalists covering the meeting for such major U.S. and European news media as the New York Times, The Smithsonian Magazine, Wired, Discover, NOVA, the BBC, Reuters and the Associated Press.

Students also mingled with some of the 250 public information officers from major universities and research institutes and centers who showed up in an effort to pitch story ideas to the press.

In addition, students who had joined the National Association of Science Writers as student members met with or shadowed professional science writers who served as mentors during the meeting.

At a gathering for mentors and students, Mike Lemonick, science writer for Time, spoke of the many different kinds of jobs available to science writers as well as about the satisfactions he has taken from writing about science over the years.

Meeting and watching science-writing professionals in action was one of the highlights of the trip, according to many of the students. Some reported awe at watching reporters from the BBC, Time and other big-time media question scientists in press briefings. Others said they were amazed at journalists working at near warp speed to turn out their stories in the press room.

The reporting and writing
But the most demanding — and potentially rewarding — part of this field experience was the actual reporting and writing. Stocking said a major goal for her students was to write publishable stories based on presentations and interviews.

By the end of the first week after the trip, three students’ stories had been published in the IDS, one had been accepted by the Bloomington Alternative and one by IU Home Pages. One student also had received a positive response to a query for a story in Harvard Magazine. Others still have queries at publications and plan to write less time-sensitive stories based on what they learned.

For students who already had published clips, AAAS hosted a science writing internship fair with editors from a variety of science writing outlets, including Science News, New Scientist, Natural History, The Smithsonian, Conservation magazine and Fermi Lab.

The experience was a little unnerving at first, reminding many students of speed dating, with five-minute interviews in which editors tried to size up prospective interns. Despite the competition from students in other college-level science writing programs, several J554 students came away hopeful that they had made a favorable enough impression that they would be called back after the meeting for additional interviews.

Stocking said students unfamiliar with science writing before taking the class now understand the importance of science writers’ work in a society that often is confused by emerging science, especially in socially significant but often controversial areas like health and health care, nuclear energy and global climate change.

Maria Karapetyan is one of those students.

“Attending the AAAS annual meeting put the entire science writing course into a real life perspective,” said graduate student Maria Karapeytyan. “It made me realize both the need for science writers and the importance of science writing.”


Read about students and alumni at science conferences.

Read students’ reflections on their AAAS experiences.

Learn more about the mentoring program.

Learn more about the AAAS and the conference.