Wellcome Trust Call for Science Learning+ Partnership Grants: Strengthening Research and Practice

Deadline: 14 June 2016

The Wellcome Trust has announced Science Learning+ Partnership Grants initiative involving a partnership of US-based National Science Foundation (NSF) and UK-based Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC).

The Programme aims to make a transformational step to improve the knowledge base and practice of informal science experiences, to better understand, strengthen and coordinate their vital role in science engagement and learning.

Programme Objectives

To strengthen the research and knowledge base by:
- investigating the value, outcomes, and impacts of informal STEM experiences, especially upon young people from birth to age 19
- developing theoretical understandings of the processes which lead to these outcomes and impacts
- developing better methodologies to measure the impacts of informal STEM experiences, especially upon learning and mediation of learning
- building research capacity in informal STEM learning.
To bridge the practice and research gap by:
- increasing partnerships, understanding, and influence between STEM education/learning researchers and practitioners
- developing collaborations among institutions and individuals engaged in informal STEM experiences
- documenting and communicating the outcomes of research-practice collaborations, such that they inform and affect practice.
To share knowledge and experience by:
- encouraging the sharing of knowledge and skills relating to informal science learning – between researchers and practitioners, across different countries (particularly the US and UK/Republic of Ireland), and across different areas of research expertise.