Announcing the 2025 NASW Excellence in Institutional Writing Award winners
The National Association of Science Writers and its Awards Committee are pleased to announce the winners of the 2025 NASW Excellence in Institutional Writing Awards.
Featured news
David Stipp—Why Rats Laugh & Jellyfish Sleep and Other Enchanting Stories of Evolution
“Familiar things we tend to ignore in our daily haste are often more interesting than they seem,” David Stipp asserts. In Why Rats Laugh & Jellyfish Sleep and Other Enchanting Stories of Evolution, he ponders Darwinian puzzles such as why many species of bees have yellow & black bands, & why humans need to sleep. Why questions about living things, he explains, often point to adaptive purposes.
Gather for games
The NASW Freelance Committee virtual meetup on Dec. 4 will be a gathering to play games together. All current NASW members are invited. This social event is a great chance to hang out with familiar faces and new colleagues — while pondering the answers to science questions in small breakout groups. No expertise is needed.
ScienceWriters2025 early bird discount ends Oct. 1; new workshop added
Deal alerts! The early bird discount for the ScienceWriters conference ends on Oct. 1 for the online and in-person events. We’ve added a new pre-conference workshop on data journalism and more discounted hotel rooms. Register today to join us!
Announcing the 2025 NASW Science in Society Journalism Award winners
The National Association of Science Writers and its Awards Committee are pleased to announce the winners of the 2025 NASW Science in Society Journalism Awards. This year, NASW is awarding prizes in six categories: Books, Science Reporting, Science Features, Longform Narratives, Series, and Commentary.
Alison Pearce Stevens—Detective Dogs: How Working Dogs Sniff Out Invasive Species
Running for miles to locate invasive weeds, mussels, and insects, e.g., the spotted lanternfly, is all in a day’s work for the dog sleuths Alison Pearce Stevens describes in Detective Dogs: How Working Dogs Sniff Out Invasive Species. Readers aged 8-12 will learn about pros and cons of tactics used to keep invasives under control: removing them, destroying them, and introducing natural predators.
U.S. reforestation faces industry-wide issues. Some groups are stepping up
A web of non-profits and businesses has brought reforestation to the public consciousness, but the industry is facing real risks.
“When will our kids be next?”: What Baby KJ’s story means for the future of gene therapy
The use of CRISPR technology as a medical intervention is revolutionary, but headlines may wrongly imply that progress is linear and generalized, that treatments for all childhood rare diseases are within reach.
Deirdre Lockwood—An Introduction to Error: Poems
“I used to follow parcels of water around the ocean,” Deirdre Lockwood reports in her poem, “My Chemistry.” She divides her first book of poetry An Introduction to Error into four sections: Materials, Methods, Results, & Discussion. A self-described “observationalist,” she offers meditations on research and life: “detecting what is or trying to write it down and not get too seasick along the way.”