Communicating science worldwide with the International Day of Light

            The International Day of Light   

• An annual UNESCO observance to raise global awareness of the importance of light science for sustainable development and the role it plays in science, culture and art, education, in fields as diverse as medicine, communications, and energy.
• The broad theme of light will allow many different sectors of society worldwide to participate in activities that demonstrates how science, technology, art and culture can help achieve the goals of UNESCO – education, equality, and peace.

• The fact that we are able to celebrate an annual International Day of Light is thanks to more than ten years of work by hundreds (thousands) of volunteers.
• Previous experience from the teams behind the International Year of Physics in 2005 and the International Year of Astronomy in 2009 was very helpful in getting started.

           International Year of Light and Light-based Technologies 2015

• For more than a decade, OSA, SPIE, the IEEE Photonics Society, ICO and many other partners have worked with the United Nations Educational and Scientific Organization (UNESCO) to raise awareness of the importance of science for sustainable development through formal international observances.
• This work began in 2009 with the construction of a multi-sectoral partnership that ultimately led to the proclamation of the year 2015 as the United Nations International Year of Light and Light-based Technologies (IYL2015). [1]
  
  _{[1]   The International Year of Light and Light-based Technologies Final Report.  J. Rivero, J. M. Dudley, K. Plenkovich, J. Niemela (Eds) SPIE, Bellingham (2015).} 
  
  

            Why May 16?

• Following the success of IYL2015 with more than 13000 events worldwide, UNESCO searched for an enduring follow-up, and the IYL2015 partnership developed the concept of an annual International Day of Light, to be celebrated on May 16, the anniversary of the first operation of the laser in 1960 by physicist and engineer, Theodore Maiman.
• The International Day of Light was proclaimed at the 2017 UNESCO General Conference, and the four celebrations held since 2018 have reached a global audience estimated at over a million, with more than 1500 events taking place in over 70 countries.
  
  International Day Light
  
• The International Day of Light now provides an enduring annual opportunity to  reach new audiences. Moreover,  the crosscutting theme of light allows us to engage with many different sectors and to focus on science communication in its general sense.
• In planning and implementing International Day of Light events, we can reach out to new scientific disciplines and communities, and the association with UNESCO  reminds us of our societal responsibilities as scientists and educators to communicate to as broad an audience as possible. 

           IDL2022  Sponsors

• The International Day of Light is administered from the International Basic Science Programme (IBSP) of UNESCO by a Steering Committee that includes representatives from a broad range of international partners.
  
• IDL is funded through Crowdfunding finances and in-kind contributions from global partners. Volunteer commitment is the core of the success of IDL.

• The day-to-day organization in 2022 used a distributed secretariat consisting of:
  John Dudley
  Overall coordination (Volunteer)
  Joseph Niemela 
  Liaison with UNESCO & sponsorship (UNESCO, ICTP)(Volunteer)

  Geethu Paulose
  IDL2022 Communications Coordinator (Astronomy & Society Group, Leiden University)

  Tasha Chicovsky
  Partner coordination & sponsorship, design (SPIE)

  John Taylor  
  International Campaign Liaison (OSA) 

  Lightsources & EPS
  Web hosting & Website technical issues

   

           IDL on Social Media

Major goals of the International Day of Light

• Improve the public understanding of how light and light-based technologies touch the daily lives of everybody, and are central to the future development of the global society.
• Build worldwide educational capacity through activities targeted on science for young people, addressing issues of gender balance, and focusing especially on underrepresented countries and emerging economies.
• Highlight and explain the intimate link between light and art and culture, enhancing the role of optical technology to preserve cultural heritage.
• Enhance international cooperation by acting as a central information resource for activities coordinated by learned societies, NGOs, government agencies, educational establishments, industry, and other partners.
• Emphasise the importance of basic research in the fundamental science of light, the need for investment in light-based technology to develop new applications, and the global necessity to promote careers in science and engineering in these fields.
• Promote the importance of lighting technology and the need for access to light and energy infrastructure in sustainable development, and for improving quality of life in the emerging economies.
• Raise awareness that technologies and design can play an important role in the achievement of greater energy efficiency, in particular by limiting energy waste, and in the reduction of light pollution, which is key to the preservation of dark skies.

            International Day of Light 2018-2021

• The graphic above provides a succinct summary of the global outreach of the five celebrations to date, revealing the unique place of the International Day of Light in cutting across geographical as well as thematic boundaries, allowing people of all ages to celebrate the many and diverse themes of light.
• Around 2250 events were held across 103 countries and worldwide. The total audience reached through International Day of Light activities since its inauguration in 2018 is estimated by our event organisers to exceed 2 million, including face to face activities, social media posts, video messages and other campaigns carried out nationally and worldwide.
• For the first two years, we ran high profile events with UNESCO to raise awareness of the event within the UNESCO community.
• The real heart of the International Day of Light are the grass-roots events that take place worldwide. 
• We do archive all registered events – a remarkable record of international outreach and produce reports every year.

• 370 registered events in 72 countries, covering themes in basic science, photonics, lighting, astronomy, healthcare, energy, industry, art, culture, education and more.
• Over 200,000 participants etimated at specific events and festivals, with a much larger number (approaching a million) involved in online events that followed the progress of the Lunar Eclipse.
• Around 13% of events took place in schools which is a major increase compared to previous years (8%).
• Awareness-raising around general themes e.g. rare disease education, holocaust education and celebration of the International Day of Living Together in Peace.

The social media impact of the International Day of Light was as usual impressive, with messages from multiple UN agencies - UNESCO, UNESCO national commissions, the United Nations in New York, the United Nations Development Programme, the UN Office for Sustainable Development, UN Women, the UNESCO Courier, and ICTP, from all the Steering Committee members. Other social media participants includes: the International Astronomical Union; the European Space Agency ESA; the ESA Hubble Telescope account; synchrotron sources and research infrastructures from around the world;  the PowerforAll coalition; many laser and photonics companies (Coherent, Nokia Bell Labs, Menlo Systems, NKT Photonics to name just a few); Export Development Canada; the US Department of Energy; the US National Photonics Initiative; the World Bank (Climate); the European Commission CORDIS (EU-funded projects); the European Commission DG Environment (Science for Environment Policy); the European Research Council ERC; the Gujarat Council on Science & Technology; HM Coastguard UK; Liter of Light Philippines, NRC Canada; Max Planck School of Photonics; and many more from the public and private sector, NGOs, and individuals around the world.  Also some very unexpected posts from Audi, Maserati, and the football club FC Bayern Munich!  

• Is the increase in virtual outreach initiatives "the new normal", or is "face to face" vital for engaging marginalised communities on the wrong side of the digital divide?
  
  The pandemic saw many IDL outreach and public engagement events adopt online formats and virtual celebrations. In many cases we observed that this actually facilitated easier international participation. IDL2020 saw over 300 events held online in 69 countries, while IDL 2021 had 370 registered events held in 64 countries. IDL2022 saw 370 registered events held in 72 countries and worldwide.
  - 2020 events were held almost fully online.
  - In 2021 more than 50% of the events were held online.
  - In 2022 around 65% of the events were held face to face/hybrid.
  While virtual adaptation improved the convinience of organisng an event we find that face to face is still the preferred normal for a heavily volunteer/outreach led global event like IDL.
  
  
• What does this mean for collaboration across Europe and further afield?
  
  IDL purely runs through the joint efforts of its steering committee, partners, sponsors and the global volunteering and outreach community. The success of IDL, is also a reflection of its valued connections and collabrations with diverse networks and grass roots intitatives. 
  
  The statistics of IDL events distributed across geographic as well as thematic boundaries, in the last four years, indicated lack of participation in certain countries that prompted us to reach out to the local communities in these regions. Our deep connections with the Optics, Photonics & Astronomy netwroks in Europe and worldwide faciliated this to a great extent, allowing us to connect with various representatives from few of these regions, communicate about IDL, share our free resources and to invite registrations. This in turn resulted in an increased participation this year.
  
  A global platform like IDL foster opportunities for grassroots inititaives and potential partners in diverse sectors of the society and across diverse disciplines to mutually connect and collaborate. These collaborations help us achieve our overarching goals and promote UNESCO goals of equality, peace and education for all. 
  
  
• How has public perception of science changed during the pandemic and what does this mean for the outreach community?
  

  Crises such as the coronavirus pandemic demonstrate the importance of scientific research and remind us how much we depend on dedicated professionals to find evidence-based solutions to global challenges, yet the last 2 years have also shown us in very stark terms that effective science communication with our larger society can be extremely difficult.

  
  With our recent and ongoing experiences of the pandemic, as well as the continual challenge of communicating the need for action in areas of climate and sustainable development it is therefore our societal responsibilities as science communicators, educators and outreach professionals to seize even the faintest of opportunities to communicate to as broad an audience as possible, bridge science, politics, & society and combat misinformation and anti-science movements

  
  IDL 2021 saw the launch of the Trust Science Campaign. The Trust Science pledge states: “Trust in evidence-based, scientific facts is essential for providing sustainable solutions to today’s challenges. By adding my name to this declaration and pledge, I recognize the key role that scientific research and discovery plays in improving quality of life for all.”

  The campaign saw 4,551 Signed Pledges (and counting) from 97 Countries attracting  support from Nobel and Breakthrough Prize Winners, science leadership, and individual scientists and students around the world.The pledge is now being shared widely to invite all interested individuals to take part. This can be observed as an indicator of general publics interest and trust towards science.

  
  IDL2022 launched 'Our Future is Light' Campaign aiming to inspire young people towards a career in optics and photonics to tackle the global challenges. Various science/optics/astronomy outreach events held this year engaged over a million participants worldwide.

Astronomy Events held as part of / in collaboration with IDL 2022 include:

1. Hidden Stars at Blackrock Observatory
2. IAU - Office of Astronomy Outreach (OAO) Dark and Quiet Skies Global Outreach Events
3. Dispersion A creative light experiment on the theme of Eclipse w.r.t the total lunar eclipse.
4. AstroCAS Dark & quiet SKies & Total Lunar Eclipse
5. Light Pollution Citizen Science
6. Raman Spectroscopy
7. IAU-NAEC training for international astro campaigns
8. SDMT Institute of Astronomical Studies is going to organize three-day IDL celebration by exhibition, workshop, astr-art competition and sky watching.
9.  Applications of  light-based technologies and their effects on the revolution in Astronomy and Space sciences.
10. Experiment with simple spectroscopes to demonstrate how the analysis of light works.
11. Outreach astronomy project, wonders of light, laser and enjoying the Total Lunar Eclipse.
12. Activities such as star gazing, interactive session on the solar system and Counseling - Young Astronomers Development and Counseling Initiative , Nigeria.
13. Project presentations, photo sessions, optical instruments used for astronomical observations . Activities for school students on the topics of geometrical and physical optics.
14. One night camping under the stars to raise awareness on the importance of preserving the night time environment from light pollution. IDA-UK, Light Collective
15. Talks for the Light and Optics Festival prepared by professors and students of the School of Physical Sciences and Mathematics of the University of San Carlos of Guatemala with support of the Amateur Astronomy Club from Quetzaltenango and the Guatemalan Association of Physics.
16. Astrophotography exhibition, Leiden
17. A science divulgation conference about James Web Spatial Telescope project, Argentina.
18. Astronomy quizzes
19. Analysis of different types of data in astronomy
20. IAU -NASE Citizen Sciene - Latitude for travelling and navigation.
21. StarGazing & citizen Science, Armenia
22. Total Lunar Eclipse, Citizen Science Activities, Argentina
23. Optica & Hands on Astronomy activities, Mexico
24. Seeing Stars Leiden
25. Seeig the MW Lecture, Brazil
26. From dawn to dusk – How does light affect the internal clock, sleep and health? Swiz
27. An online public talk on astronomy and light.