The World Science Festival and Paley Center will present Alan Alda’s Burning Question: What Is a Flame? at the Paley Center on Friday, June 1 at 4pm.
For the event, actor and science advocate Alan Alda invites scientists, teachers, and others who care about science communication to join in the discussion of one of the vital questions of our time: how to help society understand science better. Alda will report on intriguing–and sometimes surprising–results from the Flame Challenge, a worldwide contest that asked scientists to explain a flame in terms that would engage an 11-year-old.
6,000 11-year-olds judged the entries, and attendees will see the finalists’ entries at the event. The discussion will also address innovative techniques pioneered by the Center for Communicating Science at Stony Brook University, where scientists are learning communication skills as a fundamental part of their science education.