If you’ve ever developed a user-driven research proposal, you know it takes a lot of conversations, coordination, and iteration — not to mention significant investment of time and resources. Partnerships are the heart of the collaborative science approach, and success depends on assembling the right team to engage, understand, design, and deliver results to meet users’ needs. When getting started with a new collaborative science project, it’s important to commit the time and resources necessary to foster relationships among team members, end users, and other partners, establish mutual understanding, and ultimately create a shared vision for what you want to accomplish.

Join us for a discussion with two speakers from the NERRS who will share how their successful collaborative science efforts started. Speakers will highlight how small grants helped them explore ideas with partners that sparked future projects, and the importance of getting together, understanding one another’s needs, and fostering relationships to do science that makes a difference.