Keynote speakers
Dr Andi Horvath, Museum Victoria
Dr Andi Horvath, is Senior Curator, Science Communication at Museum Victoria. In
addition to curating museum exhibitions, she produces Museum Victoria’s
‘Access All Areas podcast adventures’, profiles staff on ‘Someone’s
Gotta do it’ and creates topical online mini exhibitions. Her decades of
science broadcasting experience on radio and television led her to
create the "Science Gym" programme for training scientists in
communication skills. She has also emerged as a public speaker on a wide
range of science topics.
Dr Mark Quigley, University of Canterbury
Mark Quigley is a Senior Lecturer in Active Tectonics and Tectonic
Geomorphology at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch and recent
recipient of the NZ Association of Scientist's Science Communicator's
Award for his work on communicating the science of the Canterbury earthquakes. Dr Quigley became the go-to scientist in the wake of the September 4, 2010 earthquake, providing much-needed commentary for the public and the media in the aftermath of it and the devastating Februray 22 quake.
Tom McFadden
Tom McFadden is a Fulbright Graduate Fellow doing a Masters in Science Communication at the University of Otago. While teaching at Stanford University he created music videos to communicate human biology to his students. His videos have been featured in the NY Times, The Guardian (UK), and The Scientist magazine. His research at Otago involves the creation and evaluation of a series of interactive music videos for Intermediate science students
Hon Steve Maharey, Massey University
Steve Maharey is the Vice-Chancellor of Massey University. Prior to this he was the fourth ranked Minister in Government for nine years, holding among others, the Research, Science and Technology portfolio. He is currently working on a book about the public domain and its importance in the 21st century.
| Paul Soong, The Church
Paul Soong is the founder and Managing Director of The Church, a design and communications agency based in Wellington.
The Church was the world's first design agency to focus on bridging the gap between education and employment for design graduates, helping over 40 young people start their careers. |
Dr Leon Gurevitch, Victoria University
Leon is the Director of the Culture and Context Programme, Marsden Research Scholar and Senior Lecturer at Victoria University of Wellington's School of Design. Leon's work is broadly based around the identification and implementation of Social Science research in emerging Design research contexts.
| Tracey Bridges, Senate Comms.
Tracey Bridges is a partner in Senate Communications, a consultancy specialising in reputation management, communication strategy and issues and crisis management. Tracey has worked in journalism and communications for two decades, working with public and private sector organisations to define, manage and actively protect their reputations – in good times and bad.
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Presenters and Panellists
Josh Bailey, Google
Josh Bailey is a Google software engineer and network engineering
researcher based at Victoria University in Wellington, working on among
other things Measurement Lab (http://measurementlab.net) and OpenFlow (http://openflow.org).
In his spare time he works with high voltages (Tesla coils, plasma
speakers), low voltages (home made EEG machines), and generally making
mischief.
| Kelvin Berryman, GNS Science
Kelvin is a Principal Scientist at GNS Science with over 35 years’ experience in geological hazard research and consultancy. Kelvin is one of New Zealand’s leading earthquake geologists, with particular expertise in the behaviour of active faults and seismic hazard in the Pacific region. Kelvin also manages the newly-formed research platform that integrates all of New Zealand’s government-funded research in natural hazards.
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Alison Ballance, Radio New Zealand
Alison Ballance is a zoologist who loves telling stories about nature and science, using words, sounds and pictures. She has written 28 non-fiction books, and has been a finalist at both the New Zealand Post Children's Book Awards and the Montana New Zealand Book Awards. In 2007 she won the Royal Society of New Zealand's inaugural Bill Manhire Creative Science Writing non-fiction essay award for an essay on climate change, and in 2011 she won the Royal Society of New Zealand's Science Book Prize for 'Kakapo - rescued from the brink of extinction'. | Professor Shaun Hendy, IRL, Vic Uni
Professor Shaun Hendy is Deputy Director of the MacDiarmid Institute for Advanced Materials and Nanotechnology at Victoria University of Wellington and an Industry and Outreach Fellow at Industrial Research Ltd. Shaun has research interests in nanotechnology and complex systems. Shaun writes a blog, ‘A Measure of Science’.
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Melanie Cooper, Auckland Museum
Melanie Cooper is Publicist at Auckland Museum. She has been
working in communications for nearly ten years and spent several years as
Communications Manager for AUT's Faculty of Design & Creative Technologies
and the Faculty of Health & Environmental Sciences. As a former journalist,
she believes it all starts with a good story and finding the right person to
tell that story.
| Paul Gorman, The Press
Paul Gorman is a senior journalist at The Press and had written many "passive" stories about earthquakes and the risks they posed before life changed for Cantabrians on September 4, 2010. Before that it was always a bit of an uphill battle to get science stories on the front page, but since then the public's thirst for science stories and great graphics has been incredible. Paul has a science degree from Canterbury University and worked for the MetService in another life.
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John Deal, Animal Health Board
John Deal has been the Animal Health Board's Communications Manager since February 2009 and is a member of its senior executive team. He has held a number of senior communication roles in the police and criminal justice sector in both the UK and Australia and also ran his own media and communications consultancy, working with a range of public and private sector clients.
| Katherine Trought, Enviro. Canterbury
Katherine Trought is Director of Communications at Environment Canterbury with more than 20 years’ experience in communications management, primarily in the energy, science and technology, and environment sectors. With civil defence responsibilities, her regional council team have often been at the centre of helping the community understand and cope with Canterbury’s earthquakes.
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Ruth Beran, Radio New Zealand
Ruth Beran is the co-presenter and co-producer of the science programme Our Changing World on Radio New Zealand National. She came to New Zealand from Sydney where she worked for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) on the science television programme Catalyst and before that as a journalist for Australian Life Scientist and Australian Biotechnology News.
| Veronika Meduna, Radio New Zealand
Veronika Meduna joined Radio New Zealand in 1999 and has been producing science and environment programmes every week since 2000. Apart from her work as a science broadcaster, Veronika has also written about science, medicine and natural history for the New Zealand Listener, New Zealand Geographic and other publications in New Zealand and overseas, as well as contributing to Te Ara: the online encyclopedia of New Zealand.
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Alan Dicks, Animal Health Board
Al studied Russian at the University of Nottingham, England but, due to his strong
interest in conservation, he found himself volunteering at the Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust after he graduated. Six months later, he was managing their corporate engagement programme. In 2004, he moved to New Zealand in search of a fresh challenge. A senior communications role at Wellington’s ZEALANDIA wildlife sanctuary, where the mammals he had previously been working to protect were considered mortal enemies, was just the ticket. | Elizabeth Conner, sci-comms guru
Elizabeth is a 'science communicator' by profession, translating the incomprehensible murmerings of scientists into language and concepts we can all understand. She studied Physics and Maths at Victoria University Wellington before travelling to Imperial College London to do a Masters in Science Communication. She was awarded the 2009 inaugural 'Prime Minister’s Science Media Communication Prize’.
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Peter Griffin, Science Media Centre
Peter Griffin is founding manager of the New Zealand Science Media Centre and the co-founder of Sciblogs.co.nz. He spent nearly eight years covering business and technology for the New Zealand Herald as a reporter and columnist, winning numerous awards. He is the technology columnist for the New Zealand Listener. In 2005 he relocated to Wellington to complete a masters degree in creative writing at Victoria University’s Institute of Modern Letters.
