Alan Alda Information

Alan Alda works with a group of medical students to improve their improv technique. Photo credit: The Alan Alda Center. Alan Alda lends much more than just his name to The Alan Alda Center for Communicating Science, an institution at Stony Brook University that uses improvisational theater principles to train scientists to better convey what they do-and why those outside the scientific community should care. He is responsible for the inception of the center, which was founded in 2009 but didn't take his name until 2013, and he continues to serve as a visiting professor, and to help grow the center's reach and develop new programming ideas. Mr. Alda, who shares a Hamptons home with wife Arlene-they are active in the local community: the Hampton Library in Bridgehampton named a meeting room for the couple in appreciation of their support-said in a recent interview that the need for better science communication is a "slow-burning emergency" that must be addressed. "There's probably never been a time when so much science has been coming at us so fast, and we have to understand it so we can make decisions that affect our existence," Mr. Alda said. "There's a need for people to raise questions about science as it piles up. But there's a great need for them to raise questions that are helpful, are useful, are based on a basic understanding of the science, and not just fear or misinformation." For his science advocacy through the center, and throughout his career, last month Mr. Alda was awarded the Public Welfare Medal by the National Academy of Sciences, and he was the honoree at the World Science Festival's "A Performing Arts Salute to Science" at Jazz at Lincoln Center.