PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Rebekah D. Wallace
AU  - Charles T. Bargeron
AU  - Jil Swearingen
AU  - Joseph H. LaForest
AU  - David J. Moorhead
AU  - Xuelin Luo
TI  - Workshops increase invasive species reports to EDDMapS in the Mid-Atlantic United States
AID  - 10.1101/620138
DP  - 2019 Jan 01
TA  - bioRxiv
PG  - 620138
4099  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2019/04/26/620138.short
4100  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2019/04/26/620138.full
AB  - As the prevalence of smartphones and smartphone applications has penetrated the cellular phone market, and the capabilities of features within smartphones allowed for the replacement of commonly used mapping and identification tools, Bugwood developers began to release smartphone applications for reporting invasive species. To encourage and demonstrate reporting, workshops have been held to walk users through the apps features and overall EDDMapS capabilities. To ascertain the effectiveness of workshops in encouraging reporting via smartphone apps and the EDDMapS MAEDN website, a General Linear Model was used to evaluate the number of reports received across the 2012-2017 time frame and evaluate if there was a difference in the number of reports in the years workshops were held at the Mid-Atlantic Invasive Plant Council conferences and years no workshop was held. The model indicated that workshop and time were significant factors in the number of reports submitted. Being able to confidently demonstrate the effect that workshops can positively impact data recruitment can aid in funding for outreach and educational events.