SEJournal Spring 2012, Vol. 22 No. 1

April 15, 2012–In this issue: Getting into the (Clean Water) Act; SEJ's grant program has real impact on reporting; indie enviro films at Sundance; election year buzzwords; sneak preview of SEJ's 2012 conference, Lubbock, Texas; web tool DocumentCloud brings documents to life; ex-CNN executive producer Dykstra returns to journalism; meteorologists as environmental journalists; SEJ members honored, produce videos, win awards and grants; and 5 book reviews! (Why wait 3 months for access to each quarterly issue? Get your Summer/Fall issue now: how to join or subscribe.)

Integrity Problems at Interior's Science Integrity Program?

April 4, 2012–One sign of problems came when Interior's Inspector General office launched what seemed to be a ham-handed investigation, later dropped, into activities of the scientist who sounded the alarm on polar bears losing habitat to global warming. Now Interior has fired one of its scientific integrity officers — who is defending himself by saying he was just doing his job.

Reporters, Researchers at AAAS Say Canada Muzzles Climate Scientists

February 22, 2012–The complaints came out at the Vancouver meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) this month — the main multidisciplinary science conference held yearly on the continent. Also during the meeting, a letter from six journalism and science groups called on Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper to end the muzzling-scientists policy was released.

SEJ Condemns House Science Panel Arrest of Journalist

February 8, 2012–Read SEJ's February 6, 2012, letter to Energy and Environment Subcommittee Chair Harris condemning ejection of Academy Award-nominated filmmaker Josh Fox from the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology's subcommittee hearing on EPA's policies and enforcement of water quality issues surrounding natural gas drilling or "fracking."

Annual AAAS Meeting Offers Many Environmental Stories

February 1, 2012–This year's meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Feb 16-20 in Vancouver, BC, offers dozens of sessions on environmental topics — climate change, mineral resource dependency, water, critique of science journalism, disaster recovery, science integrity in government agencies, and more.

Tap the Encyclopedia of Life's Vast Reservoir of Knowledge

January 18, 2012–From the latest issue of SEJ's biweekly TipSheet: EOL, which is searchable by both common and scientific terms, has vastly expanded its content since its launch in 2008 and now provides extensive nitty-gritty on about half of all described species, as laid out in more than 950,000 pages and more than 760,000 images.

Press Access Issues in Agency Science Policies Still Unclear, Imperfect

January 12, 2012–Environmental journalists are still waiting to see whether EPA revises the draft Scientific Integrity Policy in which it claims the right to keep scientists from talking to reporters without press office permission — and have Saddam-style "minders" sit in on interviews.

Texas Censors Climate Science; Sparks Scientists' Revolt

October 19, 2011–After officials appointed by presidential candidate Gov. Rick Perry (R-TX) deleted references to climate change from a report on Galveston Bay, other scientists asked that their names be disassociated from the report.

J-Groups at Press Club: Obama’s Science Openness Glass Only Half Full

October 5, 2011–The session, before an audience of journalists at the Press Club and another audience online, included representatives of the Columbia Journalism Review, the Associated Press, Politico, the Society of Environmental Journalists, the Association of Health Care Journalists, Reporters Without Borders, and the National Association of Science Writers. The EPA declined to attend.

CJR Probes Press Office Minders, Permissions at Fed Science Agencies

September 21, 2011–A joint investigation by Columbia Journalism Review and ProPublica into the Obama administration's science openness policies offered only faint praise for Obama's accomplishments. Nearly 400 of roughly 2,100 invited journalists responded to their survey, and they gave both the Bush and Obama administrations poor marks for openness at science agencies.