The European Research Council’s Public Engagement with Research Award recognizes and rewards grantees who successfully engage audiences outsides their domain with ERC-funded research.
All Principal Investigators in an ERC frontier research project, ongoing or ended on or after 31 December 2021, are eligible to apply but may submit only one application per ERC project under this work programme.
All applications must refer to public engagement activities that have already been completed in an ERC-funded project, such as the following:
- Citizen Science: Collaboration or consultation with the public at any project stage, from design to public consultations or citizen juries.
- Public outreach: Putting spotlight on a research topic through diverse public outreach activities, from art and science projects to exhibitions and educational programmes, including diverse audiences and venues.
- Consultation and awareness: Engaging with various citizen groups, including journalists, policymakers and NGOs, a to raise awareness, tackle societal challenges, and contribute to public debates.
Up to six prizes with a value of €10,000 each will be awarded under this work programme, applicable to current ERC grant-holders or those whose ERC grant has ended within 2 years of 1 January 2024.
Applications will be evaluated on the basis of two weighted award criteria:
- Strategy and implementation: quality of the public engagement strategy, its alignment with action objectives and audience, and the novelty or creativity of the approach, along with the appropriateness of tools, channels, and resources used.
- Impact: quantitative and qualitative evidence of the activity’s success in achieving its own public engagement objectives, including possible evidence of learning for both the research team and the engaged public regarding successful engaging strategies.
Further details on the evaluation procedure, as well as relevant promotional activities are available on the ERC website.
Last updated: 16 November 2023