Science and Security: Research Impact and Co-Production of Knowledge
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Warwick
Department Name: Politics and International Studies
Abstract
Enhanced knowledge transfer and exchange (KTE) between academia, governments and industry is now key to successful research impact and in providing partnerships that support intellectual insight and technological innovation.
In this research integrator role we will function as a facilitator - a critical friend - of the successful research teams and DSTL in order to allow them, through their own impact plans and co-ordination with other research teams, to produce high quality and user-friendly research outputs and knowledge. The research integrator team will work with successful applicants throughout all the stages of their research to:
1. Ensure that the research projects maximise impact and uptake well beyond their funding period by building durable networks between the project researchers, policy communities and other project relevant stakeholders.
2. Help foster and develop research impact communities between social (including arts and humanities) and natural/physical scientists within academia, business and industry, and policy; laying the foundations for future collaborations and continued synergies beyond the funded life of the projects.
3. Ensure that the research projects are exposed to the policy community at the earliest stages to ensure that they have sufficient input to produce significant impact whilst developing world class research findings and insights.
4. Identify opportunities through horizon-scanning to ensure that the projects keep stock of developments and opportunities within the defence and security sectors.
5. Facilitate the cross-fertilisation and integration of research findings, to provide added intellectual value, through a range of innovative strategies and techniques.
6. Ensure that our communication and engagement activities highlight the world class nature and importance of these projects and the role of ESRC, AHRC and DSTL.
Using a 'critical friendship' approach we will use 'Case Study Integrity Fora' (CSIF) to facilitate connections between academic research and the users of research, supplemented with the use of specialist online software and series of supplementary stakeholder engagement meetings to form a new approach - the Research Impact Co-Production of Knowledge (RICK) Strategy. To ensure the co-production of outstanding research our integrator activities will include: regular communications with, and site visits to, the research teams; programme meetings to understand and exploit synergies across the project teams; a bi-monthly programme newsletter and project webpage (with embedded new media technologies); direct engagements with user communities - to include workshops and meetings with government departments; and, the production of policy briefs and reports.
Our work will be undertaken in three project phases, which will follow our RICK methodology. Stage One (months 1-7) will identify emergent research challenges and the development of 'exploitation plans' to give greater visibility to the GU programme and DSTL. Stage Two (months 8-12) will develop, greater opportunities for impact, engagement and integration and explore opportunities for uptake and allow research results to inform policy-making and professional practice. Stage Three (months 13-24) will be focussed on promoting the research project's findings, producing insights and policy recommendation and establishing a lasting legacy for the projects.
We expect a range of outputs to be generated during these three stages ranging from the establishment of new contacts and networks facilitated by communication and engagement activities, to user-friendly outputs that can be published widely and utilised in horizon scanning activities. We also plan to produce one academic paper/commentary, which highlights the projects and engages with the on-going debate in that journal regarding the importance of integrating the arts, social science and the natural sciences.
In this research integrator role we will function as a facilitator - a critical friend - of the successful research teams and DSTL in order to allow them, through their own impact plans and co-ordination with other research teams, to produce high quality and user-friendly research outputs and knowledge. The research integrator team will work with successful applicants throughout all the stages of their research to:
1. Ensure that the research projects maximise impact and uptake well beyond their funding period by building durable networks between the project researchers, policy communities and other project relevant stakeholders.
2. Help foster and develop research impact communities between social (including arts and humanities) and natural/physical scientists within academia, business and industry, and policy; laying the foundations for future collaborations and continued synergies beyond the funded life of the projects.
3. Ensure that the research projects are exposed to the policy community at the earliest stages to ensure that they have sufficient input to produce significant impact whilst developing world class research findings and insights.
4. Identify opportunities through horizon-scanning to ensure that the projects keep stock of developments and opportunities within the defence and security sectors.
5. Facilitate the cross-fertilisation and integration of research findings, to provide added intellectual value, through a range of innovative strategies and techniques.
6. Ensure that our communication and engagement activities highlight the world class nature and importance of these projects and the role of ESRC, AHRC and DSTL.
Using a 'critical friendship' approach we will use 'Case Study Integrity Fora' (CSIF) to facilitate connections between academic research and the users of research, supplemented with the use of specialist online software and series of supplementary stakeholder engagement meetings to form a new approach - the Research Impact Co-Production of Knowledge (RICK) Strategy. To ensure the co-production of outstanding research our integrator activities will include: regular communications with, and site visits to, the research teams; programme meetings to understand and exploit synergies across the project teams; a bi-monthly programme newsletter and project webpage (with embedded new media technologies); direct engagements with user communities - to include workshops and meetings with government departments; and, the production of policy briefs and reports.
Our work will be undertaken in three project phases, which will follow our RICK methodology. Stage One (months 1-7) will identify emergent research challenges and the development of 'exploitation plans' to give greater visibility to the GU programme and DSTL. Stage Two (months 8-12) will develop, greater opportunities for impact, engagement and integration and explore opportunities for uptake and allow research results to inform policy-making and professional practice. Stage Three (months 13-24) will be focussed on promoting the research project's findings, producing insights and policy recommendation and establishing a lasting legacy for the projects.
We expect a range of outputs to be generated during these three stages ranging from the establishment of new contacts and networks facilitated by communication and engagement activities, to user-friendly outputs that can be published widely and utilised in horizon scanning activities. We also plan to produce one academic paper/commentary, which highlights the projects and engages with the on-going debate in that journal regarding the importance of integrating the arts, social science and the natural sciences.
Planned Impact
Impact is very much part of the overall "DNA" of this integrator programme of activity. Through the use of our CSIF methodology we will promote openness, sensitivity, readiness and responsiveness as a means of promoting impact and research take-up. This will not only be with the more immediate stakeholders within our pre-existing networks, but go beyond this looking to extend and construct networks within the horizons of the funded projects.
For the research projects our team will:
- Ensure that areas of research overlap and commonalities are integrated to present a clear research platform to stakeholders.
- Extend their networks and maximise the potential for their projects impact through programme events and brown paper bag lunches that adopt a CSIF methodology.
- Provide a methodology that allows stakeholders to be active participants in the research process itself throughout all stages of the research.
- Provide a methodology that allows space for other cultural perspectives to feed into deliberations and discussions around how research can be used, helping to overcome the problem of blind-spots in the research process.
- Design Qualtrics questionnaires to gather further impact data, whilst also providing a basis from which to make verified and quantifiable impact claims.
- Ensure clear communication and visibility of the projects to specific stakeholders and the wider public through a variety of old and new media platforms.
- Contribute to the debate regarding how the Arts, Social Sciences and Hard Sciences can be integrated to produce state of the art research.
For the research projects our team will:
- Ensure that areas of research overlap and commonalities are integrated to present a clear research platform to stakeholders.
- Extend their networks and maximise the potential for their projects impact through programme events and brown paper bag lunches that adopt a CSIF methodology.
- Provide a methodology that allows stakeholders to be active participants in the research process itself throughout all stages of the research.
- Provide a methodology that allows space for other cultural perspectives to feed into deliberations and discussions around how research can be used, helping to overcome the problem of blind-spots in the research process.
- Design Qualtrics questionnaires to gather further impact data, whilst also providing a basis from which to make verified and quantifiable impact claims.
- Ensure clear communication and visibility of the projects to specific stakeholders and the wider public through a variety of old and new media platforms.
- Contribute to the debate regarding how the Arts, Social Sciences and Hard Sciences can be integrated to produce state of the art research.
Organisations
| Description | Our role as the Research Integrator in the Science and Security programme was to work with the successful research teams and DSTL in order to allow them, through their own impact plans and co-ordination with other research teams, to produce high quality and user-friendly research outputs and knowledge. To ensure the co-production of outstanding research our integrator activities included: regular communications with, and site visits to, the research teams; programme meetings to understand and exploit synergies across the project teams; a project webpage (with embedded new media technologies); direct engagements with user communities - including workshops and meetings with government departments; and, the production of and ethics report. Impact is occurring in the Science and Security programme well beyond the funding period as a result of the networks and synergies between projects created during the programme. For example, Science and Security events have continued in the post-project phase involving project members and policymaking communities and many project have continued to work together in the post-project phase, and with DSTL. Throughout the life-course of the science and Security Programme the integrator team facilitated group discussions at workshops in highly relevant policy topics and as a result a number of projects have fed findings, through DSTL, into the Strategic Defence and Security Review (SDSR) 2015. Moreover the bringing together of project teams to discuss common issues has led to a range of jointly organised workshops and publications. The Science and Security Programme has now finished but we are still actively engaged in helping to facilitate a series of post-project workshops alongside the External Champion, RCUK's Partnership for Conflict, Crime &; Security Research (PaCCS). Notably in mid-2016 many of the Science and Security projects took part in a series of a policy workshops at the British Academy and Royal Society. These events were attended by over 50 high-level policy makers from the MOD, FCO, DSTL, Home Office and the National Crime Agency. These workshops have led to the production of three new PaCCS Policy Briefings on: • Open Source Data: Ethical and regulatory considerations http://www.paccsresearch.org.uk/policy-briefings/ethical-regulatory-considerations/ • The Governance of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) in Defense and Security: http://www.paccsresearch.org.uk/policy-briefings/governance-of-unmanned-aerial-vehicles/ • Social Media and the Armed Forces: http://www.paccsresearch.org.uk/policy-briefings/social-media-armed-forces/ These briefing have been circulated widely on the PaCCS network. http://www.paccsresearch.org.uk/news/launch-of-three-new-paccs-policy-briefings/ |
| First Year Of Impact | 2013 |
| Sector | Aerospace, Defence and Marine,Communities and Social Services/Policy,Digital/Communication/Information Technologies (including Software),Education,Government, Democracy and Justice,Pharmaceuticals and Medical Biotechnology,Security and Diplomacy |
| Impact Types | Cultural,Societal,Economic |