An increasing number of citizen science projects and initiatives are being implemented across Europe. They mostly taking place at local or national level, but some are co-ordinated internationally. This rapidly emerging mode of research and innovation shows a big potential to achieve greater societal impact and increase trust in science by leveraging collective societal capabilities, enlarging the scope of the R&I and increasing relevance, responsiveness and transparency. However, existing national and regional policies to support them are still at an early stage of development in many countries. Europe would benefit from a greater attention towards the promotion of citizen science within Member States and regions, and from a greater cooperation and shared approaches across the European Research Area.
The MLE aims to facilitate the exchange of information, experiences and lessons learned, as well as to support and scale up citizen science through identifying the good practices, policies and programmes of the various approaches at local, regional and national level, towards supporting and scaling up citizen science. Another objective is to identify citizen science campaigns that have high potential to be implemented in a collaborative way across the European Research Area.
Documents
The Policy Support Facility Mutual Learning Exercise on Citizen Science brought together 11 countries to share the experiences. The exchanges included ensuring good practices and impacts, maximizing the relevance and excellence of citizen science, enabling environments and sustaining citizen science and scaling up citizen science.
The summary article presents key findings from the Mutual Learning Exercise on Citizen Science Initiatives. Over the course of 18 months, the expert panel worked on recommendations for building an enabling environment for supporting, sustaining and scaling up citizen science.
This Final Report describes a strategic vision for Citizen Science at the national level based on the thematic topics discussed throughout the MLE and presents an approach to achieving those aims via ‘backcasting’.
This presentation includes all of the presentations from the Final Meeting held in Brussels, given by Carole Paleco, Margaret Gold, Camille Allonsius, Annelies Duerinckx, Karen Verstraelen, Didier Vangeluwe and Katrien Kolenberg.
An increasing number of citizen science projects and initiatives are being implemented across Europe. This rapidly emerging mode of research and innovation shows substantial potential in terms of achieving greater societal impact and increasing trust in science, by leveraging collective societal capabilities, by enlarging the scope of the R&I, and by increasing relevance, responsiveness and transparency.
The policy brief offers an overview of the MLE process and key findings. It specifically focuses on the policy messages and key recommendations for action to be taken towards establishing an enabling environment for support, sustaining and scaling up Citizen Science.
‘How To’ guide to the Final Report describes the backcasting approach in more detail and provides an example of how it can be applied in practice.
This presentation includes all the slides presented by Alan Irwin and Margaret Gold at the dissemination event of the MLE Citizen Science in Stockholm on 16-17th May 2023.
This report provides background information on the Mutual Learning Exercise on Citizen Science. It is written with a science policy audience in mind and provides an introduction and details of the modus operandi for the MLE.
The report first provides a brief overview of the activities that are part of the field of citizen science. It then covers the available information about participation, and the place of citizen science within the wider context of public engagement with science, including an analysis of Special Eurobarometer 516.
Presentation by Carole Paleco (NHM Brussels) and Tine Huyse (Royal Museum for Central Africa): providing hands-on experience of citizen science in action in Belgium
This Thematic Report provides a summary on the Mutual Learning Exercise on Good Practices on Citizen Science and their Impact.
This Challenge Paper provides a first overview on the Mutual Learning Exercise on Citizen Science set up by the Policy Support Facility (PSF) and DG Research and Innovation to provide practical support to Member States in relation to Topic 2 – Ensuring Good Practices on Citizen Science and their Impact.
Presentation by Rosa Arias (Science for Change), Cecilia Cabello (Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology, FECYT), Antonella Passani (T6 Ecosystems) and Judith Sarneel (Umea University, Sweden).
Presentation by Rosa Arias (Science for Change).
The purpose of this Discussion Paper is to introduce Topic 3 to the participants in the Mutual Learning Exercise and provide inputs for discussion in advance of the Topic 3 meeting that will take place in Ljubljana (Slovenia) in October 2022.
This present Paper presents the three factors that have been identified as those that could ensure the relevance and excellence of Citizen Science and an understanding of the importance of maximising the relevance and excellence of Citizen Science.
This PowerPoint Presentation includes all of the presentations from the Topic 3 meeting held in Ljubljana, given by:
- Mateja Grego,
- Dr Andrej Srakar,
- Dr Ana Slavec,
- Jaka Cibej,
- Marzia Mazzonetto,
- Karen Soacha,
- Dr Dilek Fraisl,
- Antonella Ficorilli
This Thematic Report provides a summary on the Mutual Learning Exercise on Maximising the Relevance and Excellence of Citizen Science. The Report presents the challenges of each factor, recommendations for Member State authorities to overcome these challenges and inspiring Citizen Science examples discussed during the MLE meeting in Ljubljana. The Report concludes with some key reflections.
For Citizen Science to fully live up to its potential to achieve real societal impact as well as new scientific knowledge and insights, it is essential for Member States to put an enabling environment in place that will allow Citizen Science initiatives to be sustained and thrive, and Citizen Science practices to be supported and promoted.
Part I Meeting 7 and 8 June 2022. This PowerPoint Presentation includes all of the presentations given during Part I of Topic 4 Meeting held in Vienna, namely:
Part II meeting 12-13 September 2022 presentations:
This Thematic Report focuses on enabling environments and the institutional and governance arrangements that can support Citizen Science, with a particular focus on the role of different stakeholders, including research institutes, funding bodies, public authorities, businesses and civil society organisations in promoting Citizen Science.
The purpose of this Discussion Paper is to introduce Topic 5 “Scaling up citizen science” to the participants in the Mutual Learning Exercise Citizen Science Initiatives – Policy & Practice (MLE CSI-PP) and provide inputs for discussion in advance of the Topic 5 meeting that will take place in Berlin (Germany) in November 2022.
This power point presentation includes all of the presentations from the Topic 5 Meeting held in Berlin, given by Silke Voigt-Heucke, Anne Overbeck, Antonella Radicchi, Johannes Wolters, Valerie Knapp, Philip Ackermann, Sarah Kraus, Meritxell Abril, Ana Catarino and Margaret Gold.
This Thematic Report addresses meanings, dimensions, models and approaches/strategies of scalability in citizen science as well as drivers, success factors and challenges of (up)scaling citizen science projects and initiatives across Europe. It provides a multi-dimension qualitative definition of scaling up, the MLE CSI-PP Responsible and Inclusive Scalability Framework, and eight key areas of action for policymakers aimed at supporting the (up)scaling of citizen science projects and initiatives across Europe.