Unfortunately, I agree 100%. The majority of scientists have failed drastically in their ability to communicate their research to the general public. I was a scientist in my past life.
VIDO has been somewhat of an exception in that, and we take several fronts to try to translate what I'll call our knowledge to Joe Canada.
One of the first things we do is bring multiple high school students into VIDO for hand-on-hand training with the scientists at a very early age, starting in grade 9. They work with the scientists in an effort to teach them basic science and bring it back and relay that knowledge to their parents.
From a more direct applied agricultural perspective, VIDO has two technical groups, called the VIDO beef technical group and the VIDO swine technical group. Members of those groups average between 14 and 20 and are literally producers across Canada. The VIDO beef technical group is made up beef feeders, finishers, and raisers across Canada who come to VIDO. We have meetings four times a year in which we relay the science going on at VIDO to them. It's not only that; we take papers published in the scientific journals, translate them into more user-friendly knowledge, and communicate that to them. We actually have two websites specifically for that.
We've started to tackle the problem, but there still remains a lot to be done.