Connecting with local communities

We aim to connect to local under-served communities and empower them to access stem cell research.

Why?

• Everybody should be able to use and influence scientific research, regardless of their background or interests.
• Stem cell related diseases and future therapies do not discriminate.
• Certain communities are often overlooked or excluded when delivering our engagement through the traditional channels e.g. science festivals.
• We limit the impact our engagement can make by not engaging in surrounding towns, cities and rural areas.

How?

• By creating and marketing a funding scheme to local organisations to work with us on an engagement project that meets their communities’ needs and interests.
• By experimenting with novel activities, unusual locations and targeted invitations to reach new people in the Cambridgeshire region.
• By monitoring our success in reaching new local audiences from under-served communities using demographic data and measures of ‘science capital’.

Goals

• Access to our research and laboratories by new communities
• New mechanisms and skills evolved by researchers to engage diverse audiences
• Helping make all communities feel valued and better informed