Stories

Civic Science Fellow Erica Palma Kimmerling fosters connections to strengthen science’s relationship with society

As an undergraduate studying biomedical engineering, Erica Palma Kimmerling signed up for a gene editing class expecting to dive deeper into the science. Instead, she found herself captivated by a U.S. court case the professor discussed about whether human genes could be patented.

“It wasn’t just the science that fascinated me, it was the patent litigation and the implications of being able to patent genes,” Kimmerling says. “Will Supreme Court justices even know what genes are? How are they going to determine this?”

This realization—that scientific breakthroughs mean little if society lacks the systems to understand and govern them, and equitably distribute their benefits—changed the direction of her career. 

“There can be an incredibly powerful technology and innovation, but that only takes it so far,” she says. “How it expresses itself in the world, how people interact with it—that’s much further beyond the capacity of science alone.”

This insight would eventually lead Kimmerling from bench research to the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, with a transformative stop as a Civic Science Fellow in between. Today, as senior director of future of science strategies at the Association of Science and Technology Centers, she works to help science centers, museums, and scientific institutions more broadly, earn and maintain public trust.

Finding a home in civic science

Kimmerling’s Ph.D. research at Tufts University focused on developing three-dimensional cultures of human kidney cells to better understand kidney development and disease. But as she conducted this specialized research, she found herself gravitating toward bigger questions about science’s role in society.

“Academia doesn’t really provide a lot of opportunity for that kind of thinking,” she says. “Communication and engagement were very undervalued within an academic context.”

Determined to bridge that gap, Kimmerling got involved with ComSciCon, a grassroots effort providing science communication workshops “by graduate students, for graduate students.” Next, she became a Hellman Science and Technology Policy Fellow at the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, where she worked on the “Public Face of Science” initiative, which examined public attitudes toward science and how to strengthen the relationship between scientific institutions and society. “I learned how to interpret polling data and the nuances behind it,” she says. “I gained insights into fields exploring how misinformation embeds itself in your brain.”

The project’s conclusions pointed to a systemic problem: While excellent engagement work was happening across sectors, it remained disconnected and siloed. Different fields used different language for similar concepts, organizations were reinventing wheels, and there was no unified community working on the science-society interface.

When the opportunity arose to become a Civic Science Fellow at the Association of Science and Technology Centers (ASTC) in 2020, the timing for Kimmerling was right. The Kavli Foundation and other funders had been hosting workshops that reached the same conclusion that excellent engagement work was happening, but in isolation. Now this collaborative group of civic science funders was ready to invest in solving the problem together.

Kimmerling’s role was to launch the Leaders in Science and Technology Engagement Networks designed to connect and align the scattered ecosystem of science engagement professionals. “What appealed to me about the civic science community was it was another one of these emerging spaces of people who were asking the same questions,” she says. “People who realized there was a need to deepen and strengthen the relationships between science and society.”

The Fellowship structure itself embodied the kind of cross-pollination Kimmerling says the field needs. “We were the first cohort, and we spent a lot of time on the definition of civic science,” she recalls. “A person from an artistic background who’s trying to spark curiosity in the world is taking a very different approach to civic science than someone who’s thinking about systems and structures and policy. But here in the cohort was a home where we could meet together.”

This diversity proved essential, especially when COVID-19 hit just months after LISTEN’s launch. The network’s first in-person meeting, in Denver, became its last for quite some time. But the crisis also demonstrated the urgent need for the infrastructure Kimmerling was developing.

“The focus of the network became trying to support the people who were actually leading these efforts, figuring out how to navigate in a very uncertain moment,” she says. The network pivoted to provide community and resources for engagement leaders suddenly grappling with remote work, public health communication, and rapidly evolving science.

In August 2020, LISTEN partnered with the Day One Project to host a workshop on designing a federal strategy for science engagement. The resulting policy memo outlined concrete steps the federal government could take to advance public engagement in science and was among the ideas Day One offered to the incoming president and his advisors. Those ideas became “seeds of action within the Biden administration,” Kimmerling says.

The network also identified a critical gap: While individuals understood the “supply side” of science engagement—what institutions were offering—they knew little about demand. What did people actually want from science? 

LISTEN raised funds for a national assessment of the public’s interests and motivations for engaging with science, work that continues today.

Lasting fellowship

One of the most valuable aspects of the Fellowship for Kimmerling was finding intellectual companions who shared her vision for systemic change, like Karen Andrade. “Within five minutes of talking to her, it was like, ‘Oh, you have the same brain!’” Kimmerling says. “The idea that you can create that kind of friendship and deep connection with someone because they’ve come to the same conclusion about what needs to change—that was such a special thing.”

That bond extended beyond the Fellowship when Kimmerling joined the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) in 2022 to work alongside Andrade bringing civic science perspectives to federal policy. There Kimmerling contributed to major initiatives including a letter from the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology emphasizing the importance of public engagement, and guidance from the Office of Management and Budget on public participation in federal science agencies.

She also tackled unexpected challenges, like helping to communicate that COVID spreads primarily through air, not surfaces, a message that still hadn’t penetrated public consciousness, deep into the pandemic. “I went home for Christmas and realized everyone was still talking about disinfecting surfaces,” she recalls. “I was like, ‘Someone should do something.’ And then, ‘Oh wait! I’m one of those people who could do something!’”

Kimmerling supported efforts at OSTP to elevate the importance of clean indoor air and get the message out that COVID was airborne. She helped Alondra Nelson, OSTP director at the time, develop a blog post, “Let’s Clear the Air on COVID,” and she co-authored follow-up pieces on how clean indoor air benefits everyone, not just people with compromised immune systems. The work sparked interagency initiatives and helped shift public health messaging at a critical time.

Kimmerling left OSTP after the administration change in early 2025 and returned to ASTC to continue her work. “There’s such strength in that organization, as a membership group for physical brick-and-mortar institutions, place-based institutions that have deep connections with their community,” she says. “I realized I wanted to get back to that work of building trustworthy institutions of science, and ASTC is a great place to do it.”

Today, as senior director of future of science strategies, Kimmerling continues the work she began during the Fellowship. A poll she conducted in April revealed that while 9 in 10 people in the United States value federal investment in STEM education, many have only vague awareness of how science policy affects their lives.

“People are feeling left behind by their institutions,” Kimmerling says. “Institutional trust—in government, media, higher education—is at an all-time low. That comes from those institutions not effectively meeting people where they are, addressing their needs and priorities.”

The good news is that the poll also showed that people are interested in moving from being passive recipients of science communication to engaging with the process of science, she says. More than 60 percent of those surveyed want the public to have a say in “whether and how new scientific discoveries are introduced in society.”

The future of civic science

For funders considering supporting future Civic Science Fellows, Kimmerling emphasizes the value of the cohort model. “Innovation and progress is driven by individuals,” she says. “Having one person focused on solving a specific task is incredibly valuable. But when you’re part of a cohort, you’re learning from other people interrogating similar questions. The work is better because you have thought partners.”

The fellowship model also helps address the persistent challenge of dissemination. “Half the battle is in sharing findings with others, getting people to read it and take it up. The cohort is a community of not just current Fellows but past Fellows and other funders, so there’s a way to spread the word about the work you’re doing.”

Kimmerling recommends potential funders focus dollars where they can have a larger impact by investing in cohort-based fellowships to accelerate shared learning and dissemination; fund network infrastructure (like LISTEN) to reduce siloing and jargon barriers; and support “demand-side” research on public interests and needs so engagement efforts align with what communities actually want.

And for individuals interested in getting involved in civic science, Kimmerling stresses understanding why the work matters, both to them, and to society. “Have a clear personal vision of what this is for, how science is better when it’s more deeply connected to society, how that benefits more people,” she says. “If you can clearly articulate that, it becomes a lot easier to find resources, find your community, find opportunities.”

For Kimmerling, this understanding centers on her belief that science is a public good. “It’s meant to benefit all of us. And given that, everyone should have the opportunity to have a role,” she says. “This doesn’t mean you have to be a scientist, but have a role in how we experience and engage with science in our lives.”

Erica is a member of the 2020-21 Civic Science Fellows cohort. Her Fellowship was supported by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation.