Summer is high season for citizen science projects

Summer is high season for citizen science projects that appeal to both kids and adults.

Throughout the country and around the world, citizen science projects use data gathered by ordinary people to monitor environmental trends. The proliferation of smartphones has encouraged the development of apps that make it easy to submit data and photos inexpensively and in uniform format. Summer is high season for many of these projects, and kids as well as adults can get in on the action.
Specific examples include

• Firefly Watch coordinated by Boston’s Museum of Science [https://www.mos.org/fireflies]
  
• The Association of Zoos and Aquariums’ Frog Watch USA [http://www.elearning.aza.org/frogwatch-usa]
  
• eBird, sponsored by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and the Audubon Society [http://ebird.org/content/ebird/about/]
  

Globe Observer is a program sponsored by NASA through which cellphone users can take and contribute photographs to verify satellite data about clouds and other natural phenomena. [https://observer.globe.gov/]
The following articles and websites provide an overview of multiple citizen science projects:

• https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/budding-scientist/bring-some-citizen-science-to-your-summer/
  
• https://www.nationalgeographic.org/idea/citizen-science-projects/
  
• https://scistarter.com/finder
  
• https://www.citizenscience.gov/