Polar Research Education, Outreach and Communication During the Fourth IPY

One year after the launch of the International Polar Year (IPY) Education, Outreach and Communication (EOC) Assessment Project the task of inventorying and investigating the hundreds of IPY EOC programs that occurred during the IPY 2007-08 is now complete. Supported by APECS, IASC and SCAR, this ICSU funded project is the only global examination of what happened in outreach during IPY. The latest IPY event was one of the most ambitious polar research programs to date, tens of thousands of scientists and students participated, but IPY also set out to involve members of the general public in active polar science endeavors on a global scale. This report looks at how successful was this part of the IPY plan.