Science Writing and Teaching
In 1984, Blum joined the staff of the Sacramento Bee, where she broadened her range, covering science subjects as diverse as medical issues, superconductivity, and the physics of weaponry. Her series "California: The Weapons Master" was awarded the 1987 Livingston Award for National Reporting. In 1992 the American Association for the Advancement of Science awarded her its AAAS-Westinghouse Award for Science Journalism, also for the "Monkey Wars" series.
Blum expanded the Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper series into a book of the same title. Her second book, Sex on the Brain examines the biological differences between men and women. In Love at Goon Park she explores the life and career of groundbreaking psychology researcher Harry Harlow and in Ghost Hunters she follows a quest by 19th century psychologist-philosopher William James and colleagues to apply objective scientific methods to the study of paranormal phenomena. In The Poisoner's Handbook she explores the pioneering work of two unheralded scientists who paved the way for modern forensic detectives.
Since 1997 a professor in the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, Blum has continued to write—usually on topics of science and its interrelationship with American culture—for publications that have included The New York Times, The Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, Discover, Psychology Today, Rolling Stone, The Utne Reader, and Mother Jones.
In 2005 she was appointed Helen Firstbrook Franklin Professor of Journalism, a newly endowed faculty position within the University of Wisconsin journalism school.
A past president of the National Association of Science Writers, she is a member of the governing board of the World Federation of Science Writers and has also served on such panels for the Council for the Advancement of Science Writing, the AAAS Committee on Public Understanding of Science and Technology, the National Research Council’s Board on Agriculture and Natural Resources, and the Society for Science & the Public.
Blum is also co-editor (with Mary Knudson and Robin Marantz Henig) of the book A Field Guide for Science Writers. Also, she is a regular contributor to Women in Crime Ink, which the Wall Street Journal called "a blog worth watching."
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Famous quotes containing the words science, writing and/or teaching:
“Hard times accounted in large part for the fact that the exposition was a financial disappointment in its first year, but Sally Rand and her fan dancers accomplished what applied science had failed to do, and the exposition closed in 1934 with a net profit, which was donated to participating cultural institutions, excluding Sally Rand.”
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“May my teaching drop like the rain, my speech condense like the dew; like gentle rain on grass, like showers on new growth.”
—Bible: Hebrew, Deuteronomy 32:2.