Exploring Light and Dark; Community Engagement in Collaboration with the Beacon Museum, Whitehaven
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Central Lancashire
Department Name: Research & Innovation Office
Abstract
This projects aims to place cutting-edge scientific research at the heart of a museum/visitor attraction, engaging with new audiences and strengthening the link between University researchers and the regional community. The project will be the first venture of a new collaborative partnership between the University of Central Lancashire and the Beacon Museum, Whitehaven, and will achieve the following:
Integration of scientific research into a museum gallery, placing STEM alongside aspects of history, culture and heritage and highlighting the importance of STEM to the region
Place science learning into this community hub, in an area where there are no science centres/museums/discovery centres, and use this as a launchpad for future collaborative activity.
Engagement of new audiences with STEM, especially audiences who would not normally seek out scientific information/activities
Increased visibility of higher education in an area where participation in HE is low (POLAR 3 methodology) and opportunity for aspiration-raising activity linked to the museum exhibit/outreach programme planned
A varied programme of community engagement, including dance, storytelling, craft and science sessions, that offer opportunities for a wide range of interest groups and ages to engage with the research showcased
An exciting opportunity for researchers, and students, to get involved in public engagement in a variety of ways
Forming a link with museum professionals, which we will build on in future projects, e.g. developing content around the history of UCLan's observatories
Delivery of a programme of engagement as part of the International Year of Light
Integration of scientific research into a museum gallery, placing STEM alongside aspects of history, culture and heritage and highlighting the importance of STEM to the region
Place science learning into this community hub, in an area where there are no science centres/museums/discovery centres, and use this as a launchpad for future collaborative activity.
Engagement of new audiences with STEM, especially audiences who would not normally seek out scientific information/activities
Increased visibility of higher education in an area where participation in HE is low (POLAR 3 methodology) and opportunity for aspiration-raising activity linked to the museum exhibit/outreach programme planned
A varied programme of community engagement, including dance, storytelling, craft and science sessions, that offer opportunities for a wide range of interest groups and ages to engage with the research showcased
An exciting opportunity for researchers, and students, to get involved in public engagement in a variety of ways
Forming a link with museum professionals, which we will build on in future projects, e.g. developing content around the history of UCLan's observatories
Delivery of a programme of engagement as part of the International Year of Light
Planned Impact
The main outputs from this project are:
The content for the Exploring Light and Dark exhibition (display boards, Sunscape)
Associated learning materials from the Beacon Museum's learning team/UCLan researchers
A collection of stories grounded in STFC research
A dance workshop which explores STFC research
The Sunscape installation is available to museums/events as an audiovisual experience, which explores cutting-edge science. There is scope to combine this with the outputs from the Exploring Light and Dark exhibition, to offer a traveling exhibition, and associated learning materials. We would be pleased to discuss arranging a tour of this material, to interested museums, festivals and other events. For example, it may be appropriate to include this at the British Science Festival 2016.
Both the stories and dance produced will remain the intellectual property of the freelancers and form part of their portfolio. The reach of these interventions will be increased as the freelance practitioners continue to offer this content through their future work, and this project will be acknowledged as the source of this work.
The success of this collaboration would form an interesting session at either the Engage or Science Communication Conference, and also throughout the museum sector at other relevant conferences. Within UCLan, we will invite in the museum staff to share their experiences with researchers across disciplines, at the Engage UCLan open forum. We will disseminate our experience through the Engage UCLan blog, with possible guest posts from our collaborators.
All outputs will be uploaded to ResearchFish and we would be pleased to discuss the project with any interested parties, and indeed to collaborate with additional external partners as the UCLan-Beacon collaboration develops beyond the scope of this project.
The content for the Exploring Light and Dark exhibition (display boards, Sunscape)
Associated learning materials from the Beacon Museum's learning team/UCLan researchers
A collection of stories grounded in STFC research
A dance workshop which explores STFC research
The Sunscape installation is available to museums/events as an audiovisual experience, which explores cutting-edge science. There is scope to combine this with the outputs from the Exploring Light and Dark exhibition, to offer a traveling exhibition, and associated learning materials. We would be pleased to discuss arranging a tour of this material, to interested museums, festivals and other events. For example, it may be appropriate to include this at the British Science Festival 2016.
Both the stories and dance produced will remain the intellectual property of the freelancers and form part of their portfolio. The reach of these interventions will be increased as the freelance practitioners continue to offer this content through their future work, and this project will be acknowledged as the source of this work.
The success of this collaboration would form an interesting session at either the Engage or Science Communication Conference, and also throughout the museum sector at other relevant conferences. Within UCLan, we will invite in the museum staff to share their experiences with researchers across disciplines, at the Engage UCLan open forum. We will disseminate our experience through the Engage UCLan blog, with possible guest posts from our collaborators.
All outputs will be uploaded to ResearchFish and we would be pleased to discuss the project with any interested parties, and indeed to collaborate with additional external partners as the UCLan-Beacon collaboration develops beyond the scope of this project.
| Title | Creation of Sunscape movie |
| Description | We produced an audio visual installation piece - Sunscape - which uses data (images) from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory. This was produced by researcher Professor Robert Walsh. It is an 18 minute video with moving images of the Sun, set to music. It was played on a steel structure 3.2 metres high and 4.5 metres wide, and was shown on a curved semi-circular screen which displayed a rear projected HD movie and which enabled the Sun to be displayed in a 3D effect. This was shown in the Dark side of the gallery. Chairs were provided for visitors to sit and watch the moving pictures, but visitors were also encouraged to walk up to the screen and touch the solar storms that were exploding |
| Type Of Art | Film/Video/Animation |
| Year Produced | 2016 |
| Impact | This piece will become a touring exhibit |
| URL | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7uD8zFHmooM&feature=youtu.be |
| Title | Sunscape-Educational Movie |
| Description | An accompaniment to the Sunscape movie was a 7 minute education film narrated and presented by Professor Robert Walsh which explained more about the Sun and what the images on the 18 minute movie were. |
| Type Of Art | Film/Video/Animation |
| Year Produced | 2016 |
| Impact | Forms part of the ongoing touring exhibition and has been used in schools/science festival events |
| Description | STFC Public Engagement Fellowship for Prof. Robert Walsh |
| Amount | £1 (GBP) |
| Organisation | Science and Technologies Facilities Council (STFC) |
| Sector | Public |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Start | 09/2017 |
| Description | Dance workshops- Sunscape |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Schools |
| Results and Impact | We worked with a professional dance choreographer (Ruth Spencer) who also works part-time at the university, to present cutting-edge science in participatory format, appealing to kinaesthetic learners and children who are perhaps more interested in creative endeavour than science and technology. She engaged with children at 3 local primary schools over 3 days to create dance on the subject of massive stars. She worked with our researcher Dr Joanne Pledger on the content. The dance workshops were also repeated during Lancashire Science Festival which coincided with the dates of the exhibition. Students were involved in preparing the workshops and they delivered those that were part of the Lancashire Science Festival.The dance choreographer delivered workshops at 3 primary schools in Whitehaven over 3 days to a total of 190 pupils, and her students delivered workshops at 4 primary schools in Lancashire as part of the Lancashire Science Festival over 3 days to a total of 187 pupils, making the final total for the dance workshops at 377. Feedback included: For the boys especially, the superb science content detracted from the 'dance' aspect which meant they were fully engaged in the sessions. All three members of staff said it was one of the best 'dance' workshops we have had in school! Children's perceptions of 'what is a star?' before the workshop commenced 'Didn't think it would be hot..just an old star.' 'I thought stars were there forever, never born, never die.' 'A block of lava shaped like a star's 'A light - didn't know they could be born' 'I thought all stars were the same size as the sun's 'a star is a black thing with a light shining on it' 'a ball of boiling gas' 'a big rock or asteroid' 'I thought they were pointy' 'a bright light' 'pointed' 'You look at a star from a planet' |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
| URL | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7uD8zFHmooM&feature=youtu.be |
| Description | Exhibition at the Beacon, Whitehaven |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | This project engaged with a wide public audience through a programme of events and activities, and an exhibition, hosted and delivered in collaboration with a museum. Details in brief were: • An exhibition 'Exploring Light and Dark' which took place over 1 month in the new Light and Dark gallery at the Beacon Museum (the original proposal suggested a period of 3 months but due to a delay in building work at the museum, we were only able to exhibit for 1 month to enable the museum to honour their commitments with other partners). We were the first exhibition in the new gallery and the first science exhibition at the museum. • The exhibition at the museum consisted of 9 striking exhibition boards on the subjects of the Sun, the stars and the galaxies, and also included: o Ecology and engineering research that links to Light and Dark, namely Dew Worms (Dr Kevin But) that feed in the dark but under 'White Night' conditions must adapt to light o Plasma Discharges (Dr Nathalie Renevier) where the energy of atoms creates a plasma of electrons and ions in the form of light. o We also included a board on stone circles featuring Castlerigg Stone Circle in Cumbria which was built by our ancestors in the Neolithic period and we explained how believe stone circles are aligned to the movement of the Sun, the moon and the stars. The astrophysics boards were: o Intro board - Exploring Light and Dark, listing the names of our research teams o When a Star is Born (Professor Derek Ward-Thompson) - research on proto-stars and the constellation of Orion o The Darkside and the Light (Dr Mark Norris) - research into black holes and in particular M60-UCD1 o Living with a Star (Professor Robert Walsh) - research into the Sun, showing huge solar storms o Stellar Explosions (Dr Joanne Pledger) - research on massive stars that die in supernova explosions o Light Echoes (Dr Stewart Eyres) - research on the red star V838 Monocerotis and the light echo it creates • The exhibition featured 3 interactive areas: o the Stone Circles board encouraged visitors to build their own stone circle made out of foam stones and bricks that we provided o we created a blackboard that asked visitors to look up to the sky and draw their own impression of what they could see o we created a feedback board where visitors were invited to leave Post-It notes that shared what they had learnt in the exhibition • We produced an audio visual installation piece - Sunscape - which uses data (images) from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory. This was produced by researcher Professor Robert Walsh. It is an 18 minute video with moving images of the Sun, set to music. It was played on a steel structure 3.2 metres high and 4.5 metres wide, and was shown on a curved semi-circular screen which displayed a rear projected HD movie and which enabled the Sun to be displayed in a 3D effect. This was shown in the Dark side of the gallery. Chairs were provided for visitors to sit and watch the moving pictures, but visitors were also encouraged to walk up to the screen and touch the solar storms that were exploding • An accompaniment to this movie was a 7 minute education film narrated and presented by Professor Robert Walsh which explained more about the Sun and what the images on the 18 minute movie were. This was shown on a plasma screen and again seating was provided Social media engagement was high (799 engagements from 46481 impressions) with an average engagement rate of 1.8% which is above average. The intention of the exhibition was to stimulate interest in the research areas, inspire school children to engage with science and to increase engagement with the museum from local audiences in deprived wards. We were able to show evidence of successfully meeting these aims through the qualitative feedback, interviews with teachers and pupils and audience demographic data. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016,2017 |
| Description | Exploring Light and Dark Exhibition- Lancashire Encounter Festival |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | • An exhibition 'Light and Dark' which took place on the Saturday of the Lancashire Encounter Festival (24th September) at St. George's Shopping Centre in Preston City Centre. • The exhibition consisted of 7 striking exhibition boards on the subjects of the Sun, the stars and the galaxies: o Intro board - Exploring Light and Dark, listing the names of our research teams o When a Star is Born (Professor Derek Ward-Thompson) - research on proto-stars and the constellation of Orion o The Darkside and the Light (Dr Mark Norris) - research into black holes and in particular M60-UCD1 o Living with a Star (Professor Robert Walsh) - research into the Sun, showing huge solar storms o Stellar Explosions (Dr Joanne Pledger) - research on massive stars that die in supernova explosions o Light Echoes (Dr Stewart Eyres) - research on the red star V838 Monocerotis and the light echo it creates o Plasma Discharges (Dr Nathalie Renevier) - research around the energy of atoms that creates a plasma of electrons and ions in the form of light. • We showed the audio visual installation piece - From the Earth to the Sun - which uses data (images) from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory. This was produced by researcher Professor Robert Walsh. It is an 18 minute video with moving images of the Sun, set to music. It was played on a steel structure 2.5 metres high and 4.5 metres wide, and was shown on a curved semi-circular screen which displayed a rear projected HD movie and which enabled the Sun to be displayed in a 3D effect. This was shown in a darkened area at the rear of the shop unit. Chairs and bean bags were provided for visitors to sit and watch the moving pictures, but visitors were also encouraged to walk up to the screen and touch the solar storms that were exploding • An accompaniment to this movie was a 7 minute education film narrated and presented by Professor Robert Walsh which explained more about the Sun and what the images on the 18 minute movie were. This was shown on a plasma screen at the front of the shop unit. The aim of this activity was to showcase the world-leading research happening on the public's doorstep and to increase interest in these research areas. Feedback included: I appreciate that real scientists came and explained what the round Sun and videos and stands meant Asked lots of questions and got a lot of great answers Lots of people to talk to Very insightful, amazing to look at Really great that you could ask questions etc Next time do some scheduled 'talks' Watching the images was very interesting Very good leaflets to take away and continue learning Great visualisation, science meets art Wonderful that the professors were here to talk to the future scientists Great outreach showing that UCLan physics department is doing work and research, which will hopefully inspire Preston kids into physics, and into UCLan. Very interesting Sun video Very interesting display Absolutely amazing Mesmerising! It was a surprise |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
| Description | Storytelling workshops- exploring light and dark |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Local |
| Primary Audience | Schools |
| Results and Impact | . We worked with a professional freelance storyteller (Steve Wharton) to present the research about the Sun in an accessible and engaging manner through storytelling workshops at primary schools in the local area and also at the museum on family days over a weekend. The storyteller delivered workshops at 2 primary schools in Whitehaven, to 1 school and a home school family at the museum, and to families at the museum on one weekend. The total number of participants was 660. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |