A Guide to Key Working: distributing and publicising

Posted on Tuesday, 18 November 2014 by John Oates

Dr John Oates, The Open University

As I discussed in my previous post, the aim of our ‘key working’ project was to identify the different ways of co-ordinating support for families with children or young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) and to produce a guidance booklet, primarily for practitioners and managers, to enable them to better meet the requirements of the Children and Families Act 2014.

Although we had been briefed to produce a short guide to developing key working as a printed booklet for wide distribution among local authorities and practitioners, after we had delivered our final product in April 2014, there were several weeks during which we heard nothing about progress.

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Developing key working: co-production between researchers and publics

Posted on Thursday, 6 November 2014 by John Oates

Dr John Oates, The Open University

The ‘key-working’ project was a research study funded by the Department for Education and commissioned by the National Children’s Bureau. Silvana Mengoni, Research Fellow in FELS, Janet Bardsley, Lecturer in Health & Social Care and myself, as project lead, worked with families and practitioners in both statutory and voluntary services and with commissioners and managers in local authorities. Continue reading →

Ready to ask the questions. What if no one wants to answer?

Posted on Monday, 22 September 2014 by Emma Rothero

Emma Rothero, The Open University

We have reached Phase 2 of our seed funded impact project; on time and budget. (Have a look at my previous post for an overview of Phase 1.) This progress is very pleasing for all the obvious reasons but also because it has been fairly straightforward so far. In our mini-team, we identified appropriate sites and site managers to target with our first phase of requests for interviews. We also had a good round of emails working out which questions to ask and in what order. We got ethical approval from the university and set out the email that we would send to interviewees to explain the background to the project. And we have now invited our first phase of interviewees.

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Imagining scientists in popular culture

Posted on Friday, 19 September 2014 by Denbigh Students

By Francesca Brooking and Nicole Luwaca

Back in July this year, we were part of a group of ten students selected to participate in a week long attachment at the Open University. Our aim at the start of the week was to produce two short films, exploring how scientists have been represented in popular culture. To do this, we split into two groups; each group produced one film.

Students from Denbigh Teaching School: l-r Tom Andrews, Jamie Buckingham, Cameron Edwardson, Michael O’Brien, Hashim Diriye, Yolanda Etrata, Jodie Wilkinson, Francesca Brooking, Nicole Luwaca and Lauren Billings

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Evaluating ways of capturing engagement processes

Posted on Monday, 16 June 2014 by Gill Clough

Gill Clough, The Open University

Project Team: Gill Clough, Eliz Hartnett, Andrew Brasher, Canan Blake, Anne Adams

We are really excited to have been selected for seed funding from the Evidencing Engaged Research call. This project builds on and extends the work we are doing on the JuxtaLearn Project which aims to engage students with science and technology through creative video performance (see our earlier post).

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Digital tools for communication and engagement

Posted on Monday, 14 April 2014 by Ann Grand

Ann Grand, The Open University

Creating and sustaining an online research presence

As part of a small team of researchers working within the OU’s Public Engagement with Research Catalyst team, Trevor Collins and I have been exploring how researchers across the OU are using digital tools as part of their public engagement with research activities to develop an online presence that sustains public engagement with their research. Here’s an update on the work we’ve been doing…

Research staff surveys

The first step was to include four questions in the Vitae CROS and PIRLS research staff surveys in 2013. In one, we asked respondents to give us an example of a public engagement activity they had undertaken; only 3.5% (six people) identified some form of digital engagement (e.g. blogging, citizen science, podcasting, etc.). This suggests either that respondents are unaware of the potential of digital tools as an engagement technology or do not think of digital technologies as a means for engagement.

Research project interviews

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A shared purpose for engaging research

Posted on Friday, 7 March 2014 by Richard Holliman

Dr Richard Holliman, OU Champion for Public Engagement with Research

Leadership; Mission; Communication
Champion’s blog; star date 2014.03.10 (in effect, an update on the first post on this blog, ‘An open research university‘).

Nearly two years of the mission completed; 14 months of funding left. “Where do we boldly go from here?”

I was interviewed late last year by Lucian Hudson, the OU’s Director of Communications, to explore this question. We also discussed progress with the core mission of the OU’s Public Engagement with Research Catalyst.

You can see the results of our discussion in the video below. If you’d prefer to read the text of the interview, select transcript.

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Happy 3rd Birthday: RCUK Public Engagement with Research Concordat

Posted on Friday, 29 November 2013 by Richard Holliman

Dr Richard Holliman, The Open University

Public engagement with research has come a long way since 2000. The pace of change has quickened significantly following the establishment of the National Co-ordinating Centre for Public Engagement (NCCPE), the completion of the Beacons for Public Engagement programme, the embedding of research impact within Research Council grant applications and the Research Excellence Framework (REF 2014), and the 2010 publication of the RCUK’s Concordat for Engaging the Public with Research.

Whilst each of these developments was significant, the publication of the RCUK Concordat three years ago was a watershed. In effect, its four principles were a mandate for embedding public engagement within the UK’s research culture. To celebrate the third anniversary of the Concordat’s publication RCUK have published another booklet called Inspiration to Engage.
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TED-Ed: engaging with astrobiology research

Posted on Monday, 11 November 2013 by Louisa Preston

Dr Louisa Preston, The Open University

As well as a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the Department of Physical Sciences at the Open University I have also been selected as a TED Fellow. Having been an avid watcher of the TED talks for many years I was inspired to apply to the Fellowship scheme so I could have a global stage on which to share the fantastic research being conducted in Astrobiology and to educate people worldwide on the subject of life in space.

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Blogging against the stream

Posted on Tuesday, 5 November 2013 by Meg Barker

Dr Meg Barker, The Open University

The potentials and pitfalls of social networking and blogging about research

Over the last few years I’ve developed a number of blogs to accompany my various academic/research projects and have become a big advocate of using social media in conjunction with research. Along with wordpress – which is a really easy way for non-technical folk to put up a website or blog – I’ve also used prezi to ensure that my presentations are publicly available, youtube for filmed clips, facebook and twitter for discussion and sharing relevant links, and storify to record online conversations such as livetweeting from conferences and other events.
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Engaging Research

An Open Research University: Embedding public engagement within the research culture of the OU

Category Archives: Resources

A Guide to Key Working: distributing and publicising

Developing key working: co-production between researchers and publics

Ready to ask the questions. What if no one wants to answer?

Imagining scientists in popular culture

Evaluating ways of capturing engagement processes

Digital tools for communication and engagement

A shared purpose for engaging research

Happy 3rd Birthday: RCUK Public Engagement with Research Concordat

TED-Ed: engaging with astrobiology research

Blogging against the stream