Miriam Brandt, Quentin John Groom, Alexandra Magro, Dusan Misevic, Claire Louisa Narraway, Till Bruckermann, Anna Beniermann, Tom Holmgaard Børsen, Josefa Gonzalez, Sofie Meeus

Evolutionary understanding is central to biology as a whole. It is also an essential prerequisite to understanding issues in everyday life, such as advances in medicine and global challenges like climate change. Yet, evolution is generally poorly understood by civil society and many misconceptions exist. Citizen science, which has been increasing in popularity as a means to gather new data and promote scientific literacy, is one strategy through which people can learn about evolution. Despite the potential for citizen science to promote evolution learning opportunities, very few citizen science projects exist to improve scientific literacy in evolution. In this paper, we make the case for incorporating evolution education into citizen science, define key learning goals in the context of evolution, and suggest opportunities for designing and evaluating citizen science projects in order to promote scientific literacy in evolution.