TV Weathercasters and Climate Education: Expanding the Reach of Climate Matters

这项为期三年的倡议的目标是扩大目前由全国各地的电视天气预报员提供的一种积极和有效的气候教育方法的实施。这项工作是乔治梅森大学、耶鲁大学、气候中心(一个非营利性气候科学研究和媒体制作组织)、美国气象学会、NOAA和NASA的合作伙伴。该项目将包括四项活动：(1)在全国范围内招募200名电视天气播报员(目前参与的人数刚刚超过100人)；(2)为参与活动的天气播报员提供专业发展活动和使用气候问题材料的培训，帮助他们成为自信和称职的气候教育者；(3)开发并向参与活动的天气播报员分发及时、本地化、可广播的图形和科学信息，尽可能与当地的天气和气候事件相联系，使他们更容易向观众教育当地气候与天气之间的关系；以及(4)研究和评估活动，以提高天气预报员对气候问题材料的使用率和有效性，并研究公众对气候知识的了解的影响。公众的学习成果将采用准实验方法进行评估，在项目过程中每年进行两次具有国家代表性的公众调查。指导性假设是，在一个社区(即媒体市场)中，电视天气预报员对气候问题材料的使用程度与观众对气候的理解随时间的变化之间存在剂量-反应关系。气候问题的发展是基于非正式学习和经验学习的理论。该倡议的扩大应用了源自创新扩散和社会营销理论的方法。

The goal of this three-year initiative is to expand the implementation of a currently active and proven climate education method delivered by TV weathercasters around the country. The work is a partnership of George Mason University, Yale University, Climate Central (a non-profit climate science research and media production organization), the American Meteorological Society, and NOAA and NASA. This project will include four activities: (1) recruiting 200 TV more weathercasters nationwide (currently just over 100 are participating); (2) providing participating weathercasters with professional development activities and training on use of Climate Matters materials to help them become confident and competent climate educators; (3) developing and distributing to participating weathercasters timely, localized, broadcast-ready graphics and science information, when possible tied to local weather and climatic events, to make it easy for them to educate their viewers about the local relationships between the climate and the weather; and (4) research and evaluation activities to improve the rate of use and effectiveness of Climate Matters materials by weathercasters over time and to study the effect on learning about climate by the public.Learning outcomes by the public will be evaluated using a quasi-experimental method with nationally representative surveys of the public, conducted twice per year over the course of the project. The guiding hypothesis is that there will be a dose-response relationship between the extent of TV weathercaster use of Climate Matters materials in a community (i.e., a media market) and change over time in viewers' understanding of the climate. The development of Climate Matters is based on theories of informal and experiential learning. The scaling up of the initiative applies methods derived from diffusion of innovation and social marketing theories.