KQED Science is the largest multimedia science and environment journalism and education unit in Northern California. KQED Science explores science and environment news, trends and events from the San Francisco Bay Area and beyond with its award-winning, multimedia reporting on television, radio and the Web. KQED Science also produces educator resources and actively engages in community outreach around science and environment issues.

KQED Science radio reporter Lauren Sommer reporting on the Ivanpah solar project. More than 170,000 mirrors will focus the sun’s heat on three towers where it will turn water into steam.

KQED Science was formed in October of 2012 as a result of KQED’s commitment to increasing science news coverage and the consolidation of KQED’s two award-winning science and environment focused multimedia series, QUEST and Climate Watch.

KQED Science covers breaking science news on the radio, web and social media. It also produces a weekly radio feature; in-depth television reports; the web video series “Science on the SPOT;” resources for science teachers and other educators; daily blog posts from prominent science experts; and special coverage of the science of sustainability on TV, radio, education and web resources through its QUEST Northern California unit, part of a new partnership to expand science and environment coverage with other NPR and PBS stations in Seattle, Cleveland, North Carolina, Wisconsin and Nebraska.

Education Resources

KQED Science produces high-caliber educator resources, such as science e-books and iTunes U courses, and provides educator training on using and making multimedia science resources in the classroom.

Community Engagement

KQED Science is also committed to increasing science literacy through fostering dialogue around science and environment issues. KQED Science organizes and participates in public science-related events and works closely with its community partners which include world-renowned science and environment institutions, and prominent formal and informal education partners to advance a richer understanding of science.

Editorial Guidelines

KQED Science follows strict editorial guidelines that have been adopted from the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) and National Public Radio (NPR) and uses these guidelines to maintain the integrity of its information and the essential noncommercial nature of its reporting. All of these efforts are directed toward fulfilling KQED’s mission to provide high-quality, noncommercial media that inform, educate and entertain.

Media producer Josh Cassidy and QUEST Executive producer Jason Black filming Science on the SPOT’s short video, “Shadows and Spiders : A Secret Cave in California.”

KQED Science Staff

(in alphabetical order)

Andrea Aust

Manager, Science Education

Andrea joined KQED in 2007 to coordinate education and outreach for the public television series Jean-Michel Cousteau: Ocean Adventures. She then developed the educational resources for the 4-hour documentary Saving the Bay and the multimedia series QUEST. Andrea graduated from UC Berkeley with a B.A. in Environmental Science and earned her M.A. in Teaching and Multiple Subject Teaching Credential from the University of San Francisco. Before arriving at KQED, she taught, developed and managed marine science and environmental education programs in Aspen, Catalina Island and the Bay Area.

Jason Black

Executive Producer

Jason Black started his entertainment career in feature film as an Assistant Director and was welcomed into the Directors Guild of America as a Unit Production Manager in 2003. In 2002 he founded a production company in Los Angeles called Blue Cactus Pictures, Inc. which was the production engine for fifteen feature films in four years. Over the years Jason has produced feature films, documentaries, music videos, commercials, and educational videos in every format. His projects have screened and garnered awards at various film festivals including Sundance, Toronto, Berlin and Busan. Jason started in public media at KQED as the Series Manager for the cross-platform KQED Science unit in 2011 before being hired as the Executive Producer of QUEST in 2013. He has spent 4 years in the Marine Corps (1992-1996) and holds a degree in Film and Digital Media with honors from UCSC.

Joshua Cassidy

Multimedia Producer, Science & Environment

Joshua received his BS in Wildlife Biology from Ohio University. He went on to participate in marine mammal research for NOAA, USGS, and the Intersea Foundation. From 2002-2004 he served as the president of The Pacific Cetacean Group, a nonprofit organization dedicated to teaching students K-6 about whales. In 2004 he decided to pursue wildlife filmmaking, and studied video production at San Francisco State University. Joshua is currently a graduate student in the Science and Natural History Filmmaking Program at Montana State University.

Sevda Eris

Media Publicist and Community Outreach Coordinator, Science & Environment

Sevda has worked at KQED previously as an outreach coordinator in TV Productions for such documentaries as “Coastal Clash” and “Hope on the Street” and has returned to KQED after taking time off to raise her two young girls. Sevda has more than seven years of experience managing media and public relations for a variety of international organizations, including the World Bank, America Online and the American-Turkish Council. Since moving to the Bay Area, she has been pursuing her longtime interest in documentary filmmaking. Sevda holds a B.A. in communication from U.C. San Diego and an M.A. in international relations from the Johns Hopkins University.

Andrea Kissack

Senior Editor, Science & Environment

Andrea was born in Los Angeles and discovered radio news through listening to her college radio station. With a curious mind and a love for telling stories, she set off for Tampa where she landed her first job as a reporter for Florida Public Radio. After three years reporting in an unbearably humid climate and a brief stint as a miscast opera reporter, Andrea returned to L.A. to work for public radio, then for television news and finally as a reporter for CBS radio. Andrea has been at KQED for twelve years, working first as a producer for Forum, and then as the senior producer for The California Report. She also produced Health Dialogues and other projects. For the past siyears Andrea has served as Senior Editor for Science & Environment and narrated the QUEST television program. She says she feels lucky to cover emerging science and environmental trends in a place where geek is chic.

Sue Ellen McCann

Executive Producer, Science & Environment

Sue Ellen joined KQED Public Broadcasting in 1999 and is the Executive Producer for numerous documentaries and programs at KQED. She first became interested in science and the environment in her 7th grade biology class and on her first job as an after school lab assistant. Currently, Sue Ellen acts as the Executive Producer for Science and Truly CA, a documentary series of eclectic stories about California. Many of the programs she has worked on have been honored with a variety of awards, including Academy Award nomination, and local and national Emmys. Prior to working at KQED, Sue Ellen operated Studio Miramar, an independent production company with her husband, and at the Center for Investigative Reporting were she worked on documentaries for PBS. She is a distinguished alumnus of Sonoma State University where she graduated with a BA in Liberal Studies and she received a MA from the San Francisco Art Institute.

Craig Miller

Editor, Science & Environment

Craig Miller is KQED’s Science Editor. A multi-faceted journalist at home on either end of the microphone, he brings three decades of diverse experience to KQED’s science coverage. Prior to his current assignment, Craig led the team that launched KQED’s award-winning Climate Watch project in 2008. From producing and directing documentaries on public television to his reporting for outlets such as CNN and National Geographic Channel, Craig’s background makes him uniquely suited to help lead KQED’s Science and Environment editorial team. As a radio correspondent for KQED’s The California Report, Craig has reported extensively on environmental and resource issues facing California and the American West.

Jenny Oh

Interactive Producer, Science & Environment

Formerly a television Associate Producer with QUEST, Jenny continues her cross-platform collaboration with the project as member of the Science interactive team. Jenny graduated with honors from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts Film and Television program and has worked for WNET/PBS, The Learning Channel, Sundance Channel and HBO. She also blogs for Bay Area Bites and is an avid cyclist in the Bay Area.

Linda Peckham

TV Series Editor

Linda joined QUEST in season 3, after 4 years as series editor of KQED’s arts show “Spark.” She finds splicing science stories equally creative, because the multi-talented team delivers fascinating footage to the edit room. (In her opinion scientists have cornered the 3D animation market.) Linda has been a freelance documentary editor in the Bay Area for 20 years, cutting programming for national and local broadcast, most recently the first hour of NOVA’s new series on quantum physics, “Fabric of the Cosmos”. She has edited many social justice documentaries, including the PBS hour “Not In Our Town: Light in the Darkness,” and Independent Lens’ Emmy-nominated “Tulia, Texas”. Born in South Africa, she grew up attuned to the exploitation around her—of both people and the environment; she left South Africa to study film believing it to be the medium that most inspires change. Linda taught Aesthetics of Editing at BAVC, has a B.A. in Film and an M.F.A. in Writing, and has published essays in film journals and anthologies.

Gabriela Quirós

TV and Interactive Producer, News Reporter, Science & Environment

Gabriela started her journalism career as a newspaper reporter in Costa Rica, where she grew up. She won two national reporting awards there for her series on C-sections and organic agriculture. She moved to the Bay Area in 1996 to study documentary filmmaking at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism. Before joining QUEST, she worked in different capacities for the PBS series Frontline and for many of the Bay Area’s talented independent documentary filmmakers. She is producing an hour-long documentary about how Costa Rica became the only country in the world to outlaw in-vitro fertilization.

Paul Rogers

Managing Editor, Science & Environment

In addition to his role at KQED, Paul also works as the Natural Resources & Environment Writer at the San Jose Mercury News. Since 1989 at the newspaper, he has covered issues including logging, ocean issues, air pollution, energy, water policy, endangered species, toxics, and global warming. Paul was part of the Mercury News team that won a Pulitzer Prize in 1990 for coverage of the Loma Prieta earthquake. His work has appeared in the Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Seattle Times and other newspapers. Paul also has taught environmental journalism at the UC-Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism, and at the UC-Santa Cruz Science Communication Program. From 2001 to 2010, he served as chairman of the board of the Institutes of Journalism and Natural Resources, a non-profit group based in Montana that provides training to reporters to improve environmental journalism. He lives in Santa Cruz, with his wife, Leigh Poitinger.

Craig Rosa

Senior Interactive Producer, Science & Environment

Craig is responsible for the integration of traditional and web-based media across all Science platforms, as well as ongoing production of web-only content features. Prior to joining KQED in October of 2006, he spent 11 years with The Tech Museum of Innovation in San Jose, where he worked to create innovative educational visitor experiences online and within the museum space. He was also responsible for the museum’s Information Services operations. He began his informal science interpretation career at the Brooklyn Children’s Museum as an Assistant Exhibit Developer and Greenhouse Program Coordinator. Craig has a B.A. in World Arts and Cultures from UCLA, and an M.A. in Performance Studies from New York University.

Sheraz Sadiq

TV and Interactive Producer, Science & Environment

Sheraz Sadiq is an Emmy Award-winning producer at San Francisco PBS affiliate KQED. In 2012, he received the AAAS Kavli Science Journalism award for a story he produced about the seismic retrofit of the Hetch Hetchy water delivery system which serves the San Francisco Bay Area. In addition to producing television content for KQED Science, he has also created online features and written news articles on scientific subjects ranging from astronomy to synthetic biology.

Molly Samuel

Multimedia Producer, Science & Environment

Molly Samuel joined KQED as an intern in 2007, and since then has worked here as a reporter, producer, director and blogger. Before becoming KQED Science’s Multimedia Producer, she was a producer for Climate Watch. Molly has also reported for NPR, KALW and High Country News, and has produced audio stories for The Encyclopedia of Life and the Oakland Museum of California. She was a fellow with the Middlebury Fellowships in Environmental Journalism and a journalist-in-residence at the National Evolutionary Synthesis Center. Molly has a degree in Ancient Greek from Oberlin College and is a co-founder of the record label True Panther Sounds.

Lauren Sommer

Radio Reporter, Science & Environment

As part of the Science News team, she has scaled Sierra Nevada peaks, hunted for newts in the rain, and desperately tried to get her sea legs – all in the pursuit of good radio. Originally from the Bay Area, Lauren attended Cornell University and has a background in environmental policy. Before joining KQED, Lauren cruised bunny slopes as a ski instructor in Tahoe, California and ate croissants in France as a travel writer for Frommer’s. Her work has appeared in National Geographic Adventure and Sierra magazine and on Marketplace and NPR’s Morning Edition.

Amy Standen

Radio Reporter, Science & Environment

Back before the Internet existed, Amy became hooked on radio while traveling through India with only a shortwave and the BBC connecting her to the outside world. After returning to the States, she learned to cut tape interning for a Latin American news show at WBAI in New York, before taking her first radio job as a producer for Pulse of the Planet. Since then, Amy has been an editor at Salon.com, the editor of Terrain Magazine, and has produced for All Things Considered, Weekend Edition, Living on Earth, Philosophy Talk, and other shows. She’s also a founding editor of Meatpaper Magazine.

QUEST & KQED Science Staff Alumni

Jeanette Aguilar, Science and Environment Manager

Amy Miller, TV Series Producer

Chris Bauer, Media Producer

Adam Sopko, Associate Director, Foundation Relations

Mike Kahn, Hub Content Coordinator

Michael Goode, TV Associate Producer

Ifanyi Bell, Associate Media Producer

Joan Johnson, TV Associate Producer

Sarah Kass, TV Segment Producer

Lindsay Kelliher, TV Associate Producer

Jessica Neely, Project Manager, Science Education

Suzanne Romaine, Business Manager

Josh Rosen, TV Series Producer

Laurie Schmidt, TV Series Editor

Sandy Schonning, Series Manager

Contact Us

We would like to hear your thoughts about KQED Science on television, radio, the web, and in the classroom. Send your comments to:

KQED Science
2601 Mariposa St.
San Francisco, CA 94110
(415) 553-3360

To give us feedback and pitch your story ideas email us at: science@kqed.org

Formal and informal educators who would like to find out more about our educator resources and our teacher institutes should email: ScienceEd@kqed.org.

You can also find out more via our Pressroom.