RAPID: Reimagining a collaborative future: engaging community with the Andrews Forest Research Program

The H.J. Andrews Experimental Forest is an internationally known center for forest and stream ecosystem research in central Oregon and is part of multiple research networks, including the Long-Term Ecological Research network where scientists and NSF have invested in long-term research programs about environmental change. In the fall of 2023, a major wildfire burned over much of this forest, threatening adjacent communities and destroying existing research plans and projects. The scientific community must immediately reimagine their research at the same time that the local community has to reimagine its preparation for future wildfires. This moment provides a short window of time to gain important insights into public engagement with science. With declining trust in science, it is critical to better understand approaches to involve the community in scientific research agenda setting. Public engagement with science researchers and practitioners are making important advancements in this area of work, including strengthening approaches that emphasize reciprocity and relational objectives, and creating opportunities for scientists and publics to listen to each other and feel heard in the co-production of knowledge. However, recent research about co-production of knowledge identifies a gap in evidence about how co-production for actionable knowledge related to complex environmental challenges actually happens, and how best to address tensions and challenges that can accompany such a process. To address each of the needs detailed above, this RAPID project will 1) facilitate local community public engagement with the scientific research community; 2) facilitate consideration of local community interests and priorities in the development of the new long-term research program; and 3) study the impact of a community engagement process on the scientists, the participating publics, and the long-term research plan itself. The knowledge generated from this project will immediately inform and help align H.J. Andrews Experimental Forest's research agenda with the local rural and economically disadvantaged communities' priorities, a change that will reverberate for decades to come. It will also provide an evidence-based example for others that, given the influential thought leadership in these research communities, will likely be emulated by other long-term ecological research programs, Experimental Forests, and other STEM research organizations, particularly the environmental research networks, field stations, and marine laboratories of the U.S.

This project is a collaboration between Oregon State University and McKenzie Watershed Council comprised of ~25 partners representing local residents, commercial recreational interests, rural schools, conservation organizations, utilities, and local, state, and federal government entities. Additional leadership comes from the Director of H.J. Andrews Experimental Forest. The facilitation and research components of this project employ the SCRREE framework developed through research and practice in the field of Public Engagement with Science. According to the SCRREE framework, effective public engagement with science is: Strategic, Cumulative, Reciprocal, Reflexive, Equitable, and Evidence-based. A series of approximately five community conversations, and interviews with approximately 30 scientists, staff and leaders, and community members will be immediately analyzed, summarized, and discussed with the larger research team to inform the research agenda development process. The study will use a single-case case study design with five elements: 1) community mapping, 2) community conversations, 3) interviews 4) observations of the research planning process, and 5) document analysis. Interview, observation and document data will be analyzed using thematic coding with pre-determined coding rubrics also grounded in the SCRREE framework, while allowing for additional emergent themes. Results will be shared back to the local community and H.J. Andrews Experimental Forest staff, research community, and networks. For additional national dissemination, the project will submit two peer-reviewed articles to open-source journals.