2. How did I get here?
■ Work experience Feb 2016 under
Director Leah Holmes
– Rare Eye Disease Event planning
■ 2 days/week
■ Offered paid work 2 days/week to
take over a project
■ This began taking priority… and
soon became my mentored project
instead!
3. What is ISSF public engagement funding?
■ Institutional Strategic Support Fund – a
WellcomeTrust grant awarded to
universities
■ Manchester received £1 million (matched to
make a total £2 million)
– Have been receiving this funding since
2011 – awarded a second time in 2014
■ Within the strategy, public engagement was
allotted £100k per annum
– Small grant scheme was created
■ Public Programmes team is contracted to
support awardees in evaluation, as well as
evaluate the funding as a whole
4. My Project
■ OBJECTIVE: Write a report evaluating the
impact that ISSF PE funding has had on
researchers as well as the institution as a whole
■ METHODOLOGY:
– Survey for awardees concerning
■ projects, experience of public
engagement, evaluation strategies
and the evaluation support, plans
regarding future public engagement.
– Analysis of quantitative and
qualitative data from submitted
reports and applications
– Interviews with awardees and
institutional leads
5. How it went…
■ Survey
– Took 5 versions to finalise
– Sent out to 48 researchers, 28 responded
– Most researchers felt they weren’t offered
evaluation support, were limited by time &
funding, wanted to do more PE, confused
about what & how to evaluate
event/projects
■ Interviews (~10 awardees, in various formats)
– Funding is small enough to allow
experimental PE, but large enough to
ensure quality
– Some PE projects wouldn’t have happened
without it
– Most did not know of other PE funding
sources of a similar value
– Would utilise support of Public Programmes
had they been more aware
6. How it went…
■ Recommendations from the data
– Policy for repeat applicants
– Signposting to other funding sources
– Clearer funding call/communication
generally
– Central website/database for ISSF PE
projects
– Contact awardees directly to offer
evaluation support
■ Evaluation of PE projects was the weakest area
– most researchers used audience counts and
video views as main measurement for success of
the project
7. Where will it be used?
■ Report will be given to theWellcomeTrust
■ Aid application to renew ISSF funding (and
continuation of small grant scheme)
■ Inform changes/policies for next round of PE small
grant funding calls
8. Challenges
■ TIME MANAGEMENT
– Between uni & other project
■ Chasing up researchers
– Survey responses, politely but
persistently requesting interviews
■ Understanding the depth and scope of
the project
■ Organising and prioritising data for the
report
9. Skills/Experience gained
■ Report writing
■ Survey creation
■ Data analysis (quantitative and qualitative)
■ Professionalism
■ Sitting in on calls & team meetings
– Building confidence to offer suggestions, ideas,
and constructive criticism to colleagues
■ PPI/E – what does and doesn’t qualify!
■ …and so much more
