Periodic Reporting for period 2 - SPARKS (SPARKS)
Reporting period: 2016-10-01 to 2018-06-30
Sparks is a public engagement project aimed at raising awareness of principles of Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) by inviting key stakeholders to actively question, experiment and play with science to make it relevant to society. The project shows Europeans from all walks of life that they, too, can get involved in the processes of science and that various stakeholders share the responsibility for informing and driving research and innovation. Taking place across 29 European countries, Sparks bridges the gap between the super-fast pace of scientific innovation and societal acceptance through a unique touring exhibition and set of participatory activities.
Sparks officially started on 6 July 2015 with a Kick-off meeting in Brussels. Since then, a cascade of coordinated work has been performed by 33 partners in order to reach its ambitious goals.
In October 2015 AIGHD, organised the first workshop bringing all Sparks partners together to set the scene and create a common understanding of RRI. Following this workshop, an Inception Report was produced, which informed all of the future work for the local organisers in their mission to realise and spread the concept of RRI.
In parallel, the design and construction of the Sparks exhibition “Beyond the Lab: The DIY Science Revolution” was being finalised. It explores the increasing number of inventions and scientific discoveries being made by hackers, patient groups and ordinary citizens. Each local host of the exhibition showcased an example of an RRI-inspired research project. Beyond the Lab started its tour in summer 2016. After being on show for 1,000 days and reaching more than 1 million visitors in 29 countries, it made its final stops in Ireland, Finland Poland, and Romania. Three clones of the exhibition were offered as long-term donations to science centres in Spain, the Netherlands and Poland, where visitors will be able to enjoy them until 2022.
Together with the exhibition, project partners ran participatory activities aimed at triggering interaction between citizens and researchers and ultimately at involving the public in RRI. In total, more than 240 events, attracting almost 9,000 participants, took place. Five innovative participatory event formats have been tested and developed to complement the exhibition content and to engage the public in science topics related to health and medicine, DIY science and RRI processes. All local organisers had to organise a Reverse Science Café and six Science Espressos. Moreover, they had to run one optional activity that could either be a Pop-up Science Shop; a Hackathon/Incubation Workshop; or a Scenario Workshop. 233 local partnerships were established to facilitate the delivery of these events.
Extensive data was collected in all 29 countries. This resulted in a Playful Toolkit of Activities which summarises the formats and explains how to run them. Moreover, two significant events were organised as part of the Policy Outreach mission of Sparks. The first event took place in June 2017 at the European Parliament in cooperation with the STOA committee on the topic of health systems for the future. The second event was a Reverse Science Café taking place in January 2018 in Brussels. This event attracted many researchers, civil society organisations and NGOs, and explored the topic of Post-Truth vs Science Engagement. Both events, as well as conclusions from the evaluation of the project activities, resulted in the Policy Recommendations document “Shaking-up Science and Society Relations”.
Communication activities of Sparks started with the design of a communication strategy and the visual identity of the project. Sparks has produced 9 videos, a website, active social media accounts, promotional postcards, printed brochures and 6 newsletters. The project has a strong presence on social media, engaging over 1500 followers. The project has been presented in at least 25 international events and professional forums such as IAS conference 2016 (Durban), three Ecsite conferences, Living Knowledge Conferences, Ars Electronica Festivals and MuseumNext 2017. The project generated extensive coverage, resulting in over 150 newspaper, radio and blog articles on the project, including favourable reports in major European press titles such as The Guardian, Gazeta Wyborca, and The Irish Times.
In October 2015 AIGHD, organised the first workshop bringing all Sparks partners together to set the scene and create a common understanding of RRI. Following this workshop, an Inception Report was produced, which informed all of the future work for the local organisers in their mission to realise and spread the concept of RRI.
In parallel, the design and construction of the Sparks exhibition “Beyond the Lab: The DIY Science Revolution” was being finalised. It explores the increasing number of inventions and scientific discoveries being made by hackers, patient groups and ordinary citizens. Each local host of the exhibition showcased an example of an RRI-inspired research project. Beyond the Lab started its tour in summer 2016. After being on show for 1,000 days and reaching more than 1 million visitors in 29 countries, it made its final stops in Ireland, Finland Poland, and Romania. Three clones of the exhibition were offered as long-term donations to science centres in Spain, the Netherlands and Poland, where visitors will be able to enjoy them until 2022.
Together with the exhibition, project partners ran participatory activities aimed at triggering interaction between citizens and researchers and ultimately at involving the public in RRI. In total, more than 240 events, attracting almost 9,000 participants, took place. Five innovative participatory event formats have been tested and developed to complement the exhibition content and to engage the public in science topics related to health and medicine, DIY science and RRI processes. All local organisers had to organise a Reverse Science Café and six Science Espressos. Moreover, they had to run one optional activity that could either be a Pop-up Science Shop; a Hackathon/Incubation Workshop; or a Scenario Workshop. 233 local partnerships were established to facilitate the delivery of these events.
Extensive data was collected in all 29 countries. This resulted in a Playful Toolkit of Activities which summarises the formats and explains how to run them. Moreover, two significant events were organised as part of the Policy Outreach mission of Sparks. The first event took place in June 2017 at the European Parliament in cooperation with the STOA committee on the topic of health systems for the future. The second event was a Reverse Science Café taking place in January 2018 in Brussels. This event attracted many researchers, civil society organisations and NGOs, and explored the topic of Post-Truth vs Science Engagement. Both events, as well as conclusions from the evaluation of the project activities, resulted in the Policy Recommendations document “Shaking-up Science and Society Relations”.
Communication activities of Sparks started with the design of a communication strategy and the visual identity of the project. Sparks has produced 9 videos, a website, active social media accounts, promotional postcards, printed brochures and 6 newsletters. The project has a strong presence on social media, engaging over 1500 followers. The project has been presented in at least 25 international events and professional forums such as IAS conference 2016 (Durban), three Ecsite conferences, Living Knowledge Conferences, Ars Electronica Festivals and MuseumNext 2017. The project generated extensive coverage, resulting in over 150 newspaper, radio and blog articles on the project, including favourable reports in major European press titles such as The Guardian, Gazeta Wyborca, and The Irish Times.
The Sparks project has collectively made substantial impacts at the local level. Many of the local organisers have reported that the project has contributed to positive change within their organisations and communities. Besides introducing innovative activity formats, many of which are now integrated in the permanent cultural programming of some organisations, there are numerous examples in which these activities have led to success stories beyond the initial goals set by project. In 21 cases, Sparks activities have led to new research inputs being generated from the public. 19 activities have led to new projects, 17 activities have led to new strategies and action plans, and 27 activities led to new collaborations between societal actors and/or local organisations.
The overall novelty of the project is reflected in the highly experimental nature of the research that was conducted on emerging concepts and practices. The formats of the Sparks activities and workshops were specially designed for the project, combining interactive elements to engage participants in idea sharing and debates. The exhibition’s concept was also unique, aligning personal success stories of engagement in science and disruptive visions of artists on ways the future could be influenced by the use of emerging technologies. The fact that three science centres have been given the opportunity to exhibit Beyond the Lab on long-term basis beyond the life of Sparks proves that the exhibition was of excellent quality, durability and impact. The pan-European scale on which Sparks was implemented, contributes to the complexity and uniqueness of the initiative. No other project tasked with communicating RRI to citizens has achieved such a scale before – reaching over 1 million visitors through the exhibition and close to 9,000 participants through over 240 tailored events.
The research activities developed throughout the project pioneered a practical methodology with which we observed how citizens and different stakeholders react to and engage with topics and stories related to public participation in scientific developments. The empirical nature of the research generated a preliminary set of insights into how citizens position themselves in relation to public engagement with science based on the types of events they participate in and/or their own socioeconomic backgrounds. As such, the results made available in the Capture Learning Report may be used as baseline for future studies in the topic of public engagement with science. It prepares the ground for future investigations, by proposing different correlations between different variables that can be further tested, and by elucidating the challenges and confounding factors encountered throughout the research process.
The overall novelty of the project is reflected in the highly experimental nature of the research that was conducted on emerging concepts and practices. The formats of the Sparks activities and workshops were specially designed for the project, combining interactive elements to engage participants in idea sharing and debates. The exhibition’s concept was also unique, aligning personal success stories of engagement in science and disruptive visions of artists on ways the future could be influenced by the use of emerging technologies. The fact that three science centres have been given the opportunity to exhibit Beyond the Lab on long-term basis beyond the life of Sparks proves that the exhibition was of excellent quality, durability and impact. The pan-European scale on which Sparks was implemented, contributes to the complexity and uniqueness of the initiative. No other project tasked with communicating RRI to citizens has achieved such a scale before – reaching over 1 million visitors through the exhibition and close to 9,000 participants through over 240 tailored events.
The research activities developed throughout the project pioneered a practical methodology with which we observed how citizens and different stakeholders react to and engage with topics and stories related to public participation in scientific developments. The empirical nature of the research generated a preliminary set of insights into how citizens position themselves in relation to public engagement with science based on the types of events they participate in and/or their own socioeconomic backgrounds. As such, the results made available in the Capture Learning Report may be used as baseline for future studies in the topic of public engagement with science. It prepares the ground for future investigations, by proposing different correlations between different variables that can be further tested, and by elucidating the challenges and confounding factors encountered throughout the research process.