Amani Sobhan, Senior Health Promotion Officer at South Western Sydney LHD Health Promotion Service tells us about the Citizen Science on Q project.
What is this project trying to achieve?
The aim of the Citizen Science On Q project is to engage members of the public in evaluating the impacts of Campbelltown City Council’s ‘On Q’ project which is trialling innovative improvements to public spaces on Queen Street in Campbelltown. The Citizen Science on Q project seeks to empower community members to contribute to meaningful and sustainable changes and increase their sense of connection to the Campbelltown city centre. The team also hope to build the capacity of local governments and the health promotion service in using citizen science approaches.
What does the project involve?
The Health Promotion Service at South Western Sydney Local Health District and University of Sydney have partnered with Campbelltown City Council to use a citizen science approach to evaluate the changes made on Queen Street. Employees and users of the Campbelltown CBD, acting as citizen scientists, will be asked to walk around the shared public spaces on Queen Street to capture photographs and narratives related to the healthy street indicators. Citizen scientists will be invited to a workshop to review and analyse their data. Insights from this project will be used to inform Council’s planning for future developments in the area.
Why did the Health Promotion Service choose a citizen science approach?
Using a citizen science approach, we hope to engage and empower the community to collect meaningful data and advocate for sustainable and healthy changes to their environment.
We also wanted to understand when and how local health promotion services and local government can use citizen science approaches. Our work is community driven, so we are interested in exploring ways we can engage and empower our community to create meaningful and sustainable changes. Citizen science values seem to be aligned with our values, so we were interested in exploring this approach further.
Where is the project up to?
Ethics approval has been obtained for this project and we are planning to commence data collection with citizen scientists in once COVID-19 restrictions ease
What have you learnt so far?
As this is a new way of working, particularly for local government, there have been many learnings and a few changes to the project as it has progressed. Whilst the team had initially planned for a longer-term project, we have experienced some challenges with recruitment which encouraged us to rethink the project design to facilitate more engagement. For more information about this project please contact Amani Sobhan at amani.sobhan@health.nsw.gov.au.