Fitxa persona

Maria Josep Picó Garcés has a degree in Information Sciences (Cardenal Herrera-CEU, 1996), PhD (Universitat de València, 2016) and Official Master in New Trends and Innovation Processes in Communication (UJI, 2019). She is Assistant Professor in the area of Journalism at the Department of Teoria dels Llenguatges i Ciències de la Comunicació of the Universitat de València. She directs the radio of the Faculty of Philology, Translation and Communication, Espai Pòdcast UV.

She coordinates the environmental journalism module of the Master in Scientific, Medical and Environmental Communication at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona since 2005 and is also an associate researcher at the Basque Centre for Climate Change (BC3). Among her awards is the 2005 National Environmental Journalism Award, granted by the Ministry of Environment.

She has been a researcher in the ITACA group (Research in Technologies Applied to Visual Communication) and associate professor in the Department of Communication Sciences at the Universitat Jaume I (UJI). Also of the Scientific Culture and Innovation Units (UCC+i) of the Universitat de València and the UJI and of the Department of Communication and Culture of the Jardí Botànic of the Universitat de València. At the Universidad Politècnica de València she was also responsible for communication of the European university initiative ENHANCE Alliance.

Her areas of expertise are environmental journalism and communication, sustainability and climate change, as well as new transmedia narratives for science communication in the digital environment and journalistic quality. She is currently a member of research teams -together with scientists from the Institut Cavanilles de Biodiversitat i Biologia Evolutiva- in two European projects studying wetland restoration and nature-based solutions, as well as the social acceptability of these interventions. She is a researcher in a state I+d+i project, coordinated from the Department of Geography of the Facultat de Geografia i Història, for the Development of social resilience against flood risk in a context of climate change. She is also involved in the Digital Transformation Lab of the FORTHEM Alliance, as well as in the Youth Chair of the Faculty of Psychology and at the University of Valencia.

She was a journalist specializing in environment and science in the newspaper Levante-EMV; director of the magazine Nat, of the Barcelona publisher Sàpiens Publicacions and has collaborated in different media, among them, she directed and presented the radio and transmedia program Vides de ciencia in À Punt Mèdia. She has promoted several projects of innovation in science outreach, among them, she was technical coordinator and researcher of the Living Lab Planeta Debug of co-creation of video games and art in the universe of climate change at the UJI. As an environmental journalist in the OAM of Parks, Gardens and Urban Biodiversity of the City of Valencia, she coordinated the communication and participation strategy of Green Valencia, an initiative that won the award of Valencia European Green Capital 2024.