Public Engagement Fund

About the fund 

This round of the Public Engagement Fund has been a pilot to test interest and evaluate proposed projects. Originally capped at £40,000, RDS increased the total amount of funding available to support a wider range of top-quality projects, which will reach various audiences across Scotland.

The aims of the Public Engagement Fund are to:  

• Promote the public understanding of data research in Scotland
• Provide balanced information on data research
• Widen participation by involving and engaging members of the public who may not usually interact with science to take an interest and have a voice in data science
• Achieve clear and measurable impact. 

CodeClan: Demystifying Data (£7,500) 

Codeclan is creating a free self-directed learning course on the topic of demystifying data. The course will include videos, quizzes, discussion forums and mini projects.

The course will align with Research Data Scotland’s aims of unlocking data for everyone. Participants will learn how to confidently find and use open data sources.  

University of Glasgow Schools Health and Wellbeing Improvement Research Network (SHINE): Data Linkage (£2,705.13) 

SHINE will work with young people, parents/carers and teachers to produce a video and infographic around data linkage. Within this work, discussion will focus on concerns or barriers to linking pupil self-report data to other data sources.

The new resources will help pupils, parents and teachers understand the use of data in research, how data linkage works and the wider public benefits. These resources will form part of a wider data literacy toolkit shared with schools and stakeholders. 

University of Dundee: Drug Harm Prevention Research (£9,997) 

This project will carry out focus groups with people who use drugs to explore perceptions of the use of administrative data in related research. Follow-up workshops will be carried out to produce a stop-motion animation and resource to share through the wider community and stakeholders. This work will also create a register of people who would be interested in taking part in further research activities.  

University of Edinburgh: Data in Biological Research (£2,880) 

This project will engage communities in Edinburgh, Glasgow and the Highlands on data for health collection and usage. This will be through a game-based activity inviting young people to discuss data in public health research, including the ethics and challenges to make informed future decisions.

Researchers will also be able to hear insights from young people to feed into their work and develop collaborative approaches with these audiences.  

University of Edinburgh: Generation Scotland (£5,000 approximately) 

Generation Scotland is Scotland’s largest family health and wellbeing study looking to improve the health and wellbeing of current and future generations in Scotland. This project looks to create resources around data research suitable for use at events such as science festivals and large-scale public events. This will include demonstrations of how research looking at people over time can be uniquely powerful, with a particular focus on brain development and DNA Methylation. 

The team plans to attend Edinburgh and Glasgow Science Festivals, Edinburgh and Glasgow Pride and the Royal Highland Show to reach new young audiences and engage with communities who often are not approached for research, such as LGBTQIA communities and those residing in rural Scotland. 

University of Edinburgh: Cultural Probes into Mental Illness (£7,655) 

Art and creativity play a positive role in mental health and wellbeing. Accordingly, this project will work with a group of people with lived experience of mental illness and who have been previously under-served.

Creativity will be a core theme and workshops will use a pack of activities designed to spark reflection and imagination. A small exhibition will share the outputs of these conversations and workshops.  

University of Glasgow: Perinatal Mental Health (£11,178) 

Funding will be used to build on existing paper copies of a co-produced perinatal mental health (PMH) timeline and statistical analysis of a population wide cohort of administrative data on all mothers in Scotland. A perinatal mental health timeline animation video will be co-created, featuring completed statistical analysis of population level cohort data and existing co-produced outputs. This video will be showcased at a launch event.