Looking for a useful distraction? Participate in crowd-sourced science or transcription projects to help researchers across the world!

Try your hand at being a citizen scientist by gathering or reviewing data that researchers need to analyze!

• Watch time lapse images of penguins in remote areas and count them to help scientists understand their lives. 
• Interested in going on a neighborhood walk? View a video tutorial and then head outside to collect a pollen sample to contribute to a national collection. 
• Find more opportunities for citizen science on Zooniverse  and Scistarter. Many of these activities are kid friendly, too!

More interested in historical research? There are many opportunities to transcribe archival documents, making their contents available to researchers and members of the public. 

• The Library of Congress’s By the People project offers a chance to: “transcribe and explore women's suffrage history through the lives of those who fought for the right to vote 100 years ago” along with several other projects. 
• The Smithsonian relies on over 16,000 volunteers to help transcribe materials from historical diaries to biodiversity specimen labels. Space fans will be happy to learn that they’re currently looking for help with their collection of Sally Ride’s papers. 
• The National Archives is looking for more Citizen Archivists to transcribe speeches made by Franklin D. Roosevelt and to tag photographs of America’s Scenic Byways.