Many organisations in the wider academic environment are working on connecting science and society. Here we provide a list of organisations with links to their resources. Some resources are on related concepts and developments in academia, such as open science, sustainable development goals and responsible research & innovation.
Local resources on impact
Various initiatives within EUR provide support and resources for becoming an impact-driven university. Here are some of the resources you might find useful.
National resources on impact
With the Universities in the Netherlands (UNL), 14 Dutch universities show the outside world how they fulfil their social function, formulate shared ambitions relating to academic education and research and valorisation, and lobby for the preconditions needed to realise these ambitions. The link to society is stated explicitly for several UNL activities:
- Strategy Evaluation Protocol (SEP) for research (in Dutch)
- Recognition and Rewards of academics
- Knowledge transfer (in Dutch)
- Open science (In Dutch)
NWO defines societal impact as ‘Cultural, economic, industrial, ecological or social changes that are entirely or in part the consequence of knowledge and expertise generated by research.’ The current strategic plan ‘Connecting Science and Society’ includes several themes that relate to societal impact: open science, knowledge and innovation covenant and knowledge utilisation.
The most explicit link NWO makes about creating societal impact is for knowledge utilisation. This is defined as an iterative process where the chance of societal impact increases by stimulating productive interactions with social stakeholders both during the development and in the execution of the research. NWO's three knowledge utilisation approaches vary in type of activity and stage in proportion to the expectation of societal impact.
- Impact Outlook Approach: to facilitate (unforeseen) opportunities for social impact during the project term.
- Impact Plan Approach: for contributing to social issues.
- Impact Focus Approach: for applying already developed knowledge and insights.
If you are planning to apply for a NWO grant, there are e-learning modules to help you get started on incorporating societal impact into your proposal.
The Dutch Organisation for Health Research and Development (ZonMW) has societal impact as one of their core activities. See their page Development of implementation policy for more.
The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen, or short: KNAW) published a report in 2018 ‘Maatschappelijke impact in kaart' with several policy recommendations in relation to societal impact evaluation.
International resources on impact
The United Nations developed 17 interlinked global Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) designed to be a "blueprint to achieve a better and more sustainable future for all". Though broad and interdependent, the 17 SDGs were made more actionable by identifying specific targets with progress indicators for each goal. There is a full list of 169 SDG Targets and 232 unique progress indicators. Mapping how academic activities relate to the SDGs can aid the identification of societal relevance.
Within the EUR, sustainability is one of seven EUR priorities also embodied by the strategic Sustainable Development theme.
Within the European Union Horizon 2020 program Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) is the key action of the ‘Science with and for Society’ objective. RRI is an approach that anticipates and assesses potential implications and societal expectations with regard to research and innovation, with the aim to foster the design of inclusive and sustainable research and innovation.
Check out the RRI toolkit.
Open science is a movement towards more open and collaborative academic practices. This can be about sharing and re-use of academic output at the earliest possible stage (e.g. publications, data, software), but also involving other parties throughout the process (e.g. citizen science). The UNESCO Recommendation on Open Science provides an international framework for open science policy and practice that recognises disciplinary and regional differences in open science perspectives. Open Science is a policy priority for the European Commission. For the Dutch context, a 2021 Rathenau institute report 'Moving forward together with open science' described when and how to organize meaningful public involvement as part of open science.