Interview with a NatCapper: Kiara Fufunan
The Stanford Natural Capital Project (NatCap) Director of Communications Elana Kimbrell sat down with Kiara Fufunan just before her graduation from Stanford with a Bachelor's degree in Earth Systems, to talk about her time -- more than three years -- with the NatCap communications team.
Tell us about your role at NatCap!
I’ve been a communications intern at NatCap for about three years, starting partway through my freshman year. I mostly worked on social media campaigns. Recently I’ve focused mainly on #TrainingTuesdays, which is more about highlighting InVEST [NatCap’s free, open-source ecosystem services modeling software] and tutorials on YouTube about it, and #DidYouKnow, which is more about different projects and papers NatCap has been involved with.
What brought you to this internship?
I actually came to Stanford wanting to do some sort of science communication. I always found it very rewarding making scientific research more accessible to others – so when I received the application through the Stanford Earth Systems program mailing list, I was really intrigued by the mission of NatCap, to showcase the value of nature. I had mostly done it [science communication] through working with a researcher at the Field Museum in Chicago. I was involved in a lot of community science – getting the public involved in scientific research. But I hadn't done anything written before.
How did you grow or evolve over your years at NatCap?
I have looked at my old designs and I can see how much I've improved in my ability to show and not tell. The designs are more streamlined. Less is more sometimes, especially with photos. But also in the way I write social media captions. It’s been really interesting to see what people respond to. Things like GIS [geographic information systems] have always done really well, I’ve noticed.
What was one of your favorite projects?
The most recent one that I think about a lot was my “Interview with a Natcapper” series. Since I work remotely, I’m not always super directly connected to the work that NatCap does.. it’s kind of just whatever comes back to me. But with this series, I was able to directly meet and talk to people about their work... Everyone has such different backgrounds and motivations, and it’s really interesting to see them all united by this one organization.
What are some key challenges you have found in science communication?
Something that is challenging is getting right to the point: why does this matter? In a lot of our revisions [that we go back and forth on], I get back, “this is a really interesting thing this paper has done, but why does it matter?” Being able to parse through really academic, jargony papers.. and getting to that broader question: “what does this mean for the broader field, the affected region, the affected communities?”
Any tips for writing social media posts?
It really depends on the source material. Honestly, one way I model or fit my language best is by reading some of the articles you write about the papers. The structure is really easy to follow. It’s not necessarily dilution but.. it’s going from paper to press release to social post, so a lot of things can get lost in translation. So it’s helpful to see it written already in plain language, and take that and condense it. When it comes to scientific papers, what has helped is going into the intro and the discussion to find the quoteworthy stuff.
What are your plans for the future and what are you looking forward to?
I will be pursuing a Master’s in Earth Systems at Stanford and doing a fellowship with the Stanford Office of Sustainability – working on community outreach related to wildfire risk resilience. I will definitely be using the communications tools I got at NatCap to carry out that work.
After that, I think I want to pursue a PhD. Maybe then I will be on the other side, doing the research, and someone hopefully will want to write about it. That is always the goal, whatever I do: that my work is accessible for others and makes people more passionate about environmental science.
Any last words?
I've been very grateful to have worked with NatCap for so long. I feel like I have really grown as a scientist and as a writer through it, so thank you.
NatCap thanks you and wishes you well, Kiara!
The Natural Capital Project is based out of Stanford University, with core collaborators at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, Stockholm Resilience Centre, the University of Minnesota, The Nature Conservancy, and WWF. NatCap-Stanford is part of the Woods Institute for the Environment within the Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability, and the Department of Biology within Stanford’s School of Humanities & Sciences.
