Towards Responsible Research and Innovation: practical experiences
An effective dialogue between science and the rest of society is vital to find the right answers to the challenges faced by today’s European society. In this process it is important to involve as many stakeholders as possible. Science centres and museums, as mediators and places of neutral exchange, are ideally suited to facilitate and enable such a manifold exchange of ideas and values, necessary to move towards developing and implementing a practice of what is today called ‘Responsible Research and Innovation’ (RRI).
A number of EU-funded projects are currently developing and implementing various approaches towards this goal. In this session representatives of four of these projects (RRI Tools, IRRESISTIBLE, NUCLEUS and SPARKS) will present their approaches and share their experiences, focusing both on successes and challenges. Participants will then have the opportunity to join speakers in a discussion, contributing own ideas and approaches to the spectrum of Responsible Research and Innovation.
Session speakers
Bart will present the EU project IRRESISTIBLE in which various activities have been designed to foster the involvement of students and the public in the process of RRI. The aim is to raise awareness on RRI by increasing pupils' content knowledge about research. This is achieved by combining formal (school) and informal (science centre, museum or festival) educational approaches to introduce relevant topics and cutting edge research into the programme.
Are you struggling to get a clear understanding of what RRI is and how should it be implemented? The Toolkit developed by RRI Tools is a great place to look for answers. Carlos will present dozens of unique and reliable tools to use in a variety of RRI scenarios. He will also provide participants with a clear understanding of why RRI is becoming the future of scientific advancement and social innovation, and enabling them to reflect on why science and society should never be separated again.
Annette will represent NUCLEUS, “New Understanding of Communication, Learning and Engagement in Universities and Scientific Institution”, a 4 year HORIZON 2020 project striving to implement the process of RRI into the governance and culture of universities and scientific institutions. The session will describe the challenge to coordinate 24 transdiciplinary consortium members from 18 countries – among them partners in China and South Africa - in this ambitious and challenging endeavour!
Andrea will introduce the new EU project Sparks, which is all about communicating and raising awareness of RRI amongst citizens in every single EU country through an interactive touring exhibition and various participatory activities. RRI is not an easy topic to understand, so we will look at the project’s approach and challenges of how to discuss such a complex topic with the general public, how to take cultural differences into account and how to make RRI practical and hands on.
