Newswise — MCLEAN, Va. (April 3, 2017) - As an international and interdisciplinary scientific organization, the Society for Risk Analysis (SRA) will partner with the March for Science to be held April 22. SRA President Margaret MacDonell, Ph.D., describes this international movement to champion the role of science in serving society and advancing the common good as strongly aligning with SRA’s founding principles.

Dr. MacDonell emphasizes that, “The aim of our Society is to provide an open forum for all those interested in risk analysis, which is central to the goals of the March for Science to support scientific research, science education, and the use of scientific evidence in policymaking.”

SRA joins more than 100 partnering societies and organizations, including the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), American Physical Society (APS), and American Geophysical Union (AGU). SRA is a nonprofit, scholarly organization with nearly 2,000 members, encompassing 15 specialty disciplinary groups and 25 regional geographic groups, including 14 in international communities.

Prof. Sharon Friedman, director of the Science and Environmental Writing Program at Lehigh University and SRA’s representative to the AAAS and leader for this partnership, said, “The March is a unique opportunity to emphasize the importance of science, engineering and medicine for enriching people’s lives. It is a way for all citizens to show their support for science and the need for scientific integrity. Everyone—not just scientists--can join the March or participate in other sponsored activities include teach-ins, science events and open houses.”

March events will be held in Washington, D.C., and hundreds of other locations across the United States and more than 40 countries around the world, in Asia, Africa, Australia, South America, and Europe.

The March recognizes the role science plays in our society, to support scientific innovation and discovery and the people and programs that make it possible. It aligns with the core values of SRA and other partnering organizations: scientific integrity, the free and open exchange of science, diversity and inclusion, informing policy with evidence based science, and the value of investing in scientific research and education for the benefit of humanity.

The SRA Governing Council endorses the Society’s partnership with the March for Science, consistent with our vision and goals. SRA is a multidisciplinary, interdisciplinary, scholarly, international society that provides an open forum for all those interested in risk analysis The goals of the Society are to (1) bring together individuals from diverse disciplines and from different countries and provide them opportunities to exchange information, ideas, and methodologies for risk analysis and risk problem solving; (2) foster understanding and professional collaboration among individuals and organizations for the purpose of contributing to risk analysis and risk problem solving; (3) facilitate the dissemination of knowledge about risk and risk methods and their applications; (4) encourage applications of risk analysis methods; (5) promote advancement of the state-of-the-art in research and education on risk analysis; and (6) provide services to its members to assist them in developing their careers in risk analysis.

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About SRAThe Society for Risk Analysis is a multidisciplinary, interdisciplinary, scholarly, international society that provides an open forum for all those interested in risk analysis. SRA was established in 1980 and has published Risk Analysis: An International Journal, the leading scholarly journal in the field, continuously since 1981. For more information, visit www.sra.org.