Editing for science.
It takes a range of special skills to edit science projects. Science editing includes tasks as diverse as checking that numbers in tables match the text, editing maps and diagrams, and checking references and in-text citations. Ensuring that authors don’t contradict each other in different chapters is also an important element.
From understanding how to manage common versus scientific names to ensuring terminology is consistent and correct, science editing incorporates not only my skills as an editor but draws on my 20-year background as a researcher.
Even though science editing is detail-oriented, I make sure that the concepts and terminology don’t get in the way of the reader understanding the big picture, and that the text is at an appropriate level for the intended audience.
Case study.
Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO).
Member of editing panel.
CSIRO is Australia’s national science research agency. With over 5,500 employees, CSIRO has research centres in all of Australia’s states and territories working to solve some of the world’s biggest challenges, and using science to make a positive future for people across the globe.
The CSIRO Northern Australia Water Resource Assessment (NAWRA) was an integrated, multidisciplinary investigation of opportunities for water and agricultural development in northern Australia. For 2½ years, over 100 scientists worked together to investigate three priority river catchments in northern Australia, delivering water resource assessments and identifying irrigated agriculture opportunities. Potential environmental, social and economic impacts, as well as risks associated with water resource use, were also assessed.
The editing panel worked remotely as a team to edit and proofread more than 30 technical reports, three catchment reports that integrated the technical information into a catchment story, three summary reports and a key findings document.
Large reports were often broken into individual chapters and divided between the editors on the panel. The revised chapters were then combined into one final document. The PerfectIT editing tool and a comprehensive style guide assured consistency within and between these documents.
The editing panel was specifically acknowledged in the reports:
“Our documentation, and its consistency across multiple reports, were much improved by a set of copy-editors and Word-wranglers who provided great service, fast turnaround times and patient application (often multiple times) of the Assessment’s style and convention standards.”
The NAWRA team, including the editing panel, was awarded a 2020 CSIRO Collaboration Medal for work on “the world’s most extensive, multi-disciplinary water resource study”.