The Comics Project: Synthesizing and Communicating Science with Comics

Students, especially non-science majors, often see science as abstracted from their daily lives. Moreover, students often struggle to translate scientific concepts into everyday language in order to communicate to their communities what they have learned about those concepts. The Comics Project is designed to humanize biology so that students understand the relationship between science and issues that they face in their lives. Students are challenged to de-jargonize science and communicate their understanding visually by creating a comic, either individually or as a group. The project is flexible to fit in any type of course. Students are introduced to scientific literature and learn to use high-quality sources of scientific information. Then, students develop comics to communicate about their questions regarding socio-scientific issues which may be as related to the course topic as the instructor desires. For example, students might explore questions such as: Does BPA affect male fertility?; What is the genetic component of skin cancer?; or How do microplastics affect our water supply? Students create comics to synthesize what they learn from exploring primary literature. The comics are appropriate for sharing on social media. Comics are a powerful and accessible way to make science come alive for non-scientists. Through this process, students come to see science as meaningful in their own lives beyond the classroom and learn to communicate complex science with simple visuals. Primary image: Image of a comic, drawn by the author, Cara Gormally. Image shows an ovum emerging, ovulating, from an ovary and traveling through the fallopian tube.