Co-creating a toolkit of resources and building knowledge share between students on how to communicate their own research to wider audiences

Created as part of a University College London's Changemakers Programme

Abstract

The aim of the project was empower students to disseminate their research with wider audiences to create impact. The project was scoped to address the increasing demand for masters students to understand how to disseminate their research. With growing emphasis of digital platforms and channels, there are ways for researchers to disseminate their research in novel and engaging ways that can help to increase impact on science and society. We co-created a communications toolkit and set up external mentorship support with past students to help with the pastoral support and additional support from those that had a similar experience. Students that took part in the co-production workshops reported that they would like to be involved in a project like this again for the following reasons – 1) that it was a great initiative to improve student experience outside of answering surveys; 2) it helped to open up a safe space to voice personal concerns and reassured them about their upcoming research process; 3) felt that this helped improve their academic skills by understanding the different ways of gathering data and how this could help form insights.