The Social Sciences Impact Conference 2023, held in Oxford, showcased over 550 social sciences impact partnerships resulting from 10 years of Oxford’s ESRC Impact Acceleration Account. The conference featured over 140 speakers from 64 organisations who shared insights and success stories across 37 sessions. Keynote speakers included Julia Black, Ricardo Fuentes Nieva, and Diego Sànchez-Ancochea. The conference covered a range of topics such as public engagement, community, policy, and business engagement initiatives, and provided practical support on developing impact strategies, measuring and evidencing impact, and delivering impact responsibly, inclusively, and ethically. The conference aimed to promote engagement, collaboration, and hopeful action and attracted delegates from diverse professional backgrounds and lived experiences. The recordings of select sessions, interviews, and insights from the conference will be shared on their website. The top five most important keywords from the content are Social Sciences Impact Conference, impact-focused projects, research, collaboration, and diversity.
Social sciences research plays a critical role in helping us understand the world and make positive changes to it. This year’s Social Sciences Impact Conference, held in Oxford on 20-21 March, focused on the theme of turning “Hope into Action” by delivering inclusive, responsible, and scalable impact.
Over 200 stakeholders, including social scientists, policymakers, research funders, public and third sector representatives, and research impact professionals came together at St Anne’s College, Oxford to explore questions surrounding impact delivery and measurement. More than 140 speakers from 64 organisations shared their experiences across 37 sessions, including 10 livestreamed for online audiences.
Keynote speakers included Julia Black, the President of the British Academy, who highlighted how social sciences can mobilize research for social good. Black introduced the work of Aspect (A SHAPE Platform for Entrepreneurship, Commercialisation and Transformation) and encouraged researchers to think about scaling and sustaining their impacts. Ricardo Fuentes Nieva, Director of Equity and Social Protection at ODI and Chief Economist of Data-Pop Alliance, and Diego Sànchez-Ancochea, Head of the Department of International Development at Oxford, discussed the role of research in tackling inequality, how advances in data evidence have shifted the narrative, and how we can make further progress in the future.
The conference included panel discussions, case studies, and workshop sessions covering a variety of topics. Projects from the UK and beyond were showcased, ranging from public engagement and grassroots participatory research to community, third sector, and policy engagement initiatives, as well as business engagement and commercialisation. The highlights of the conference were:
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First-hand experiences shared by members of the Bangladeshi community in London, young people who survived the Manchester Arena attack, advocates for the Roma and Showmen communities, third sector organisations, and businesses about their experiences.
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Impact across the life course and in times of crisis, with projects focusing on engaging and supporting children and their families through to projects supporting elderly people and end-of-life care.
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Supporting impact in different places and contexts, including the Global South and LMICs, in cities, and for travelling communities.
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Practical support on developing impact strategies, measuring and evidencing impact, and delivering impact responsibly, inclusively, and ethically.
The Social Sciences Impact Conference 2023 provided a platform for researchers, stakeholders, and partners to come together to share insights, success stories, and experiences. It demonstrated the importance of social sciences research in understanding and positively influencing the world around us, and provided practical support for delivering impactful research that can make a real difference.
The Oxford Social Sciences Impact Conference 2023 brought together contributions from 30 universities, showcasing impact-focused projects from the University of Oxford and its partners, including Oxford Brookes and Reading Universities, as well as ESRC, NCCPE, BEIS, GO Science and the Innovation Caucus.
In addition to panel sessions, the conference also featured a lively exhibition and range of social activities, sponsored by Aspect, OxCo, Oxentia and Scriberia.
Aileen Marshall-Brown, Head of Engagement, Social Sciences Division, University of Oxford and Event Lead, emphasized the value of engagement, collaboration and hopeful action. The conference attracted delegates from a diversity of professional backgrounds and lived experiences, leaving them feeling energized and inspired by the amazing projects and partnerships on display.
The conference programme also celebrated the O2RB partnership between the University of Oxford, The Open University, the University of Reading, and Oxford Brookes University, and the more than 550 social sciences impact partnerships resulting from 10 years of Oxford’s ESRC Impact Acceleration Account. The conference was generously funded by the ESRC (grant reference: ES/T502005/1).
The recordings of select sessions, as well as special interviews and insights from the conference, will be shared on their website.
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