2007 Honorary Member
Rosalind Reid has been editor of American Scientist, the interdisciplinary magazine of Sigma Xi, since 1992. Under her direction, the magazine has played a prominent role in the communication and public discussion of scientific research and issues at the interface of science and society. Reid launched the magazine's first Web site in 1995 and in 2003 directed the development of American Scientist Online, a fully illustrated content database and suite of online services. An advocate for improving the use of pictures in communicating complex scientific ideas and for broad access to the results of research, she has been a co-organizer and presenter for Image and Meaning, the MIT/Harvard-sponsored series of collaborative workshops aimed at improving the visual expression of science. She has also led communication workshops for scientists in the U.S., Latin America, Scandinavia, Canada and Europe and taught course modules in the public communication of science at Duke University. In 2003 she was the first Journalist in Residence at the Kavli Institute of Theoretical Physics at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Trained as a newspaper journalist, Reid holds a master's degree in public policy sciences from Duke University and was an award-winning reporter for daily newspapers in Maine and North Carolina. She came to Sigma Xi in 1990 after six years as assistant news director and research news editor at North Carolina State University. She is a member of the National Association of Science Writers.