This is a topical collection of papers resulting from a symposium organized during the annual meeting of the Entomological Collections Network in November 2024 in Phoenix, Arizona. The symposium, titled “Collections Reaching Out”, showcased diverse experiences from faculty, curators, collection managers, and students across the U.S., Scotland, and Colombia. The symposium focused on the conception, preparation, use, and management of outreach drawers in entomological collections. Outreach drawers are defined here as sets of specimens curated specifically for public education and awareness.
The abstracts for the talks presented at the symposium can be found at https://ecnweb.net/welcome/meeting/ecn-2024/2023-program/, pages 4–11.
Despite their recognized educational value, outreach drawers remain understudied, with limited understanding of their intention, design, use, and assessment for enhancing educational impact. This collection of papers aims to address these gaps by exploring their role in education, sharing best practices, and discussing strategies to maximize their effectiveness.
The papers in this collection will fall into the categories of research articles, short communications, collection descriptions, case studies, methods, and community science, focusing on topics such as curation and education, and the use of entomological collections to engage with the public. Manuscript submissions are due 31 March 2025.
This is a topical collection of papers resulting from a symposium organized during the annual meeting of the Entomological Collections Network in November 2024 in Phoenix, Arizona. The symposium, titled “Collections Reaching Out”, showcased diverse experiences from faculty, curators, collection mana ...