Abstract
Demonstrating the impact of public engagement is an increasingly important activity for today’s academics and researchers. The difficulty is that many areas of interest do not lend themselves well to evaluation because the impact of each single intervention can be hard to trace and take time to become manifest. With this in mind, we evaluated a lecture based around the 2011 Royal Institution Christmas Lectures, ”Meet Your Brain,” delivered to school children from low performing schools. We compared knowledge about four neuroscience facts one week before, one week after and six weeks after the lecture. Analysis revealed significant knowledge transfer one week after the lecture that was retained five weeks later. We conclude that public engagement through tailored lectures can have significant impact in the moderate term with the potential to leave a lasting impression over a longer period.
Highlights
In 2010, the Concordat for Engaging the Public with Research was signed by the UK research councils that “recognizes the importance of public engagement to help maximize the social and economic impact of UK research.”[4]. The Concordat is designed to support activities that include working with science centers, creating opportunities to inform research questions, presenting to the public, engaging with young people and contributing to new media
We presented schoolchildren with a lecture about basic neuroscience designed around the content of the 2011 Royal Institution Christmas Lectures and evaluated knowledge one week before, one week after and six weeks after the lecture
The general finding was that prior to the lecture there was ignorance concerning the content to be delivered in the lecture, but a significant educational shift one week after the lecture with approximately four out of every 5 children recognizing the correct answer to questions
Summary
In 2010, the Concordat for Engaging the Public with Research was signed by the UK research councils that “recognizes the importance of public engagement to help maximize the social and economic impact of UK research.”[4] The Concordat is designed to support activities that include working with science centers, creating opportunities to inform research questions, presenting to the public, engaging with young people and contributing to new media These objectives are to be evaluated and implemented in a nation-wide analysis of research activities that will have major financial implications for the UK’s Higher Education Institutes (HEIs). The audience members of the original lectures in London were already motivated to learn about science and so it was judged more appropriate and valid to conduct our study on children from underperforming schools where there was greater need to demonstrate the value of public engagement for science education
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