Dena Seidel
Director, Editor, Second Camera, Science Storytelling Mentor
Dena Seidel is science storytelling mentor, science communication researcher and Emmy award-winning science filmmaker. Since 2008, Seidel has been working with scientists at Rutgers to develop her innovative science-in-action video storytelling ™ model that translates science for public audiences while engaging students in new bodies of scientific knowledge.
Science-in-action™ video storytelling has emerged as a powerful pedagogical and public-engagement tool that bridges STEM learning with science communication, drawing on cognitive theories of multimedia learning and narrative processing to make complex scientific content more accessible, memorable, and emotionally resonant for participating students and broader audiences. Science video storytelling is recognized as an innovative, high-impact model for advancing STEM education while simultaneously strengthening the public’s relationship with, and confidence in, scientists, their methods and their findings.
Our Science Storytelling Lab’s learning model builds on extensive literature on the effectiveness of video storytelling to strengthen students’ STEM identity, agency and belonging and increase public trust in science. Seidel supervises undergraduate and graduate students who shape science video data into compelling science video stories as part of their own research through storytelling.
Seidel has supervised and directed several science films featuring Rutgers scientists while including undergraduates in the creative process including “Fields of Devotion“, “Antarctic Edge: 70° South” “Atlantic Crossing: A Robot’s Daring Mission” and “Generation at Risk” and The War After. Rutgers students mentored by Seidel have directed several successful research-based films on their own including The Women of Nsongwe, Skycatcher, The Princess of Piombino and most recently Life on the Edge: Exploring New Jersey’s Ecosystems and Biting Back: The Lifesaving Potential of Catnip, Where Waters Meet on the Breathing Shore and Growing a Caribbean Glider Fleet.