Do you have a brilliant idea for engaging people or involving them in your research? Great news, the Public Engagement Unit's Engage & Involve Grants funding call is now open.

Engage and Involve Grants funding call

For the 2024/2025 Engage & Involve Grants, we have a total of £25,000 available. This funding call is open to staff members in the Research & Education and Technical & Experimental job families (any discipline or career stage) and doctoral students.

We have three levels of funding available:

• Small – four grants of up to £1,000
• Medium – four grants of up to £3,500
• Large – one grant of up to £7,000

Public Involvement & Engagement with Research

When we talk about high-quality public involvement and engagement with research, we mean activities that allow people to discover, use, discuss, participate in, and/or create research in meaningful ways.

These activities have a few common features. They should:

• relate to active and specific research
• involve people outside academia in spaces or at times where they can choose to participate
• be relevant (in terms of interests, needs and goals) to the people involved and / or engaged
• be beneficial for the people involved and /or engaged as well as for you and / or your research

What we're looking to fund

We are interested in funding activities that improve the connections between research and society through high-quality public involvement and engagement with research.

We know it can mean different things to different people depending on your experience level and the discipline you're working in.

It could mean carrying out public involvement and engagement (PPIE) if you are working in areas aligned to health, it could mean sharing research at a science festival, it could mean carrying out workshops to co-create a resource to disseminate research outcomes.

Here are some examples to illustrate what we mean by this:

• hosting a series of workshops with young farmers to listen to their experiences of using biotechnology to help shape a funding proposal
• working with a community-based partner to co-create a funding grant application
• working with a group of young people to develop materials for their peers to share and disseminate outcomes from a project on sexual health
• co-creating an exhibit on sustainable transport solutions that will be taken to science festivals with a group of science centre professionals

High-quality public involvement and engagement can happen at any stage of the research life cycle and even after a project has finished with activities that might help to sustain relationships developed during the research.

How to apply

We have pulled together this Engage & Involve Grants guide, which outlines key details of the call, including assessment criteria and key dates. You can apply using the Engage & Involve Grants application form. We'd be happy to have a chat if you're unsure of how best to classify the purpose of your activity. Drop us a line (public-engagement@bath.ac.uk).

Information session

Come join us on Wednesday 13 November 1.15-2pm for an information session about the scheme. Drop us an email for the Teams link, public-engagement@bath.ac.uk.

Drop in Surgeries

We're also hosting some informal drop in surgeries if you want to chat to us about your application. Drop us a line at public-engagement@bath.ac.uk to reserve a space for any of these surgeries.

In-person advice surgeries at Wessex Staff Hub on:

• Wednesday 13 November, 1-3pm
• Thursday 21 November, 12.30-2pm

Online advice surgeries:

• Monday 11 November, 12-2pm
• Tuesday 19 November, 2-4pm
• Tuesday 26 November, 1-3pm

Deadline

The Engage & Involve Grants are now open, and the call will close at 4pm on Thursday 5 December 2024.  Please email applications to public-engagement@bath.ac.uk.

Get in touch

If you have an idea and would like to discuss it with us ahead of submitting an application, we would love to chat, drop us a line (public-engagement@bath.ac.uk)