In 2022, the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC, rsc.org) directly part-funded 3 I’m a Scientist (IAS) Zones to engage students with chemistry. Members of the RSC participated in a further 4 Zones.
This report is a summary of the activity in, and an evaluation of, the impact of those Zones.
IASUK RSC Zones 2013-21 Evaluation Report (Click image to read full report, [PDF])
Between 2013 and 2021 the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC, rsc.org) funded or part funded 32 IAS zones to engage students with chemists.
This report is a summary of the activity in, and an evaluation of, the impact of those zones.
The Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) directly part-funded 3 IAS zones in 2021 and members of the RSC participated in a further 7 zones. Overall, 7,327 students from 185 schools engaged with RSC members in 180 live chats, with 80% actively engaging. 64% of participating schools were in underserved areas, and 51 RSC members from various fields within science engaged with the students.
Participation in IAS supports students’ science capital and has a positive impact on RSC members, with 83% reporting an increase in skill in communicating with lay people and 77% being more interested in continuing with other forms of engagement activities after IAS.
Between 2018 and 2020 the Medical Research Council (MRC, mrc.ukri.org) funded 5 IAS zones to engage students with MRC research. This report is a summary of the activity in, and an evaluation of, the impact of those zones. Read the full report [PDF] ❯ Summary
I’m a Scientist, Get me out of here is an online, student-led STEM enrichment activity. Since 2008, we have connected school students with scientists through energetic instant messaging-style chats. With the fast onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, I’m a Scientist, Stay at home was planned in a short four week period of turmoil and uncertainty from late-March to mid-April 2020. The pandemic completely changed the way we run our activity. Read the full report ❯ This report is a summary of the activity in, lessons learnt, and an evaluation of the impact of this event. Our capacity modelling was based on 5% of UK schools requesting space in the activity. This seemed reasonable based on promotional support and our unique position of being able to provide online STEM enrichment at scale. This would involve up to 150,000 students connecting with 1,800 scientists. Recruitment Interest levels were excellent. By the end … Continue reading
Summary We ran 24 zones across 5 events between November 2018 and March 2020: 20 IAS zones 4 IAE zones 142 STEM professionals took part: Scientists and engineers showed students a wide range of backgrounds, careers, and routes into STEM. 9,516 students logged in with 91% actively engaging. Students from 169 schools engaged. 67% of participating schools were widening participation or in underserved areas. The activity had a positive impact on students, teachers, and scientists and engineers: Teachers reported that the activity was effective in improving students’ motivations towards STEM, helping students see how STEM relates to the world around them, challenging stereotypes, and developing students’ awareness that STEM qualifications can be useful even if students don’t want to work in science. [A student] took part in the family live chat in the evening. The next day she was so excited and told me she couldn’t believe her luck in … Continue reading
Following school closures from 20 March 2020 due to the global outbreak of COVID-19, the Green Zone was run as a pilot for further I’m a Scientist, Stay at home zones planned for the 2020 Summer Term. The Green Zone was run as a pilot zone to work out what improvements would be required to enable a massive upscaling of the I’m a Scientist activity. It was an online space in which teachers could book live chats for their students prior to the Easter break. Delivery included moderation, and management and liaison with teachers and scientists. Read the evaluation report [PDF] Additionally, a summary of key data on activity in the Zone, with examples of engagement and some analysis of popular discussion topics is available in the Green Zone Report.
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The idea they can speak to a real psychologist kinda blows their mind. They read about studies in books but don’t see those researchers as actual people
Teacher, Society Zone, June 2018
Download and read the full report (PDF)[/caption]
In 2018 the British Psychological Society (BPS) agreed to fund multiple IAS psychology zones each year, where students across the UK connect with psychologists and BPS members.
Main findings from evaluating the psychology zones funded by the British Psychological Society between June 2018 and March 2019: Continue reading
Following a pilot project in February 2015, in 2017 Wellcome funded Mangorolla CIC to run the Science of Learning Zone between January and June 2018. The Science of Learning Zone was a place for teachers to send questions to, and have conversations with neuroscientists, psychologists and education researchers on topics around the science of learning. This report summarises the project, and the impact on teachers, participants and researchers. Download the report: The Science of Learning Zone 2018, Evaluation Report [PDF] The Zone attracted teachers: 87% of registered users were school teachers — two-thirds of whom had more than 10 years experience of teaching — or were involved professionally in education. 54% of the 2,220 visitors who completed a pop-up question without registering declared themselves to be teachers. Registered teachers told us they knew about education research but not about neuroscience and psychology. They were hoping to improve their confidence as a … Continue reading
In 2014, the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) agreed to support I’m a Scientist over 3 years. Each year, they fund 9 zones across the UK and Ireland. Part of the arrangement is that we include five RSC members in general zones across the year to show school students the full breadth of science. Below is a summary of our main findings after evaluating the 9 RSC funded zones of I’m a Scientist, Get me out of here 2016. Scientists improved their science communication skills and enjoyed an invigorating experience: “Taking part in this competition has reminded me why I love science, and I shall return to my research with renewed enthusiasm!” – Steve Street, chemist, Drug Discovery Zone The zones saw a great number of conversations around chemistry themes with keywords like “climate change”, “toxic”, “enzymes”, “battery”, “drug”, “energy”, “bacteria” being prominent in questions and live chats. 30 RSC … Continue reading
In 2013, we received an STFC Large Award to engage students with STFC research in 27 I’m a Scientist and I’m an Engineer zones over three years. During this time, we’ve measured every activity we’ve run, and we have stopped to look more closely at aspects like widening participation, or the impact of the events in researchers and students. The STFC has been one of our most important funders, after the Wellcome Trust, in the last three years. This is a summary of how the collaboration has impacted I’m a Scientist and I’m an Engineer: 135 scientists and engineers have engaged with 10,602 students from all around the UK between June 2013 and March 2016. STFC zones reached a diverse set of students. 276 teachers, from 242 different schools geographically spread around the UK took part. Of these schools, 15% of them are Widening Participation schools. Students and teachers leave positive comments … Continue reading
The Wellcome Trust provided funding to support the I’m a Scientist events in November and March of this academic year. We’ve written a report on what this funding allowed us to do, read it here. Below are the key outcomes from the report: 6 I’m a Scientist zones were run with Wellcome Trust funding in November 2015 and March 2016, including 2 themed zones, Fat Zone and Heart Zone, and 4 general science zones, two of which were for primary schools only. 30 scientists were able to engage with school students, including 22 biomedical-related researchers. Of these, 45% were doing research supported by the Wellcome Trust 2,826 school students logged into the zones, an average of 455 per zone. 85 schools got a place in I’m a Scientist Wellcome Trust funded zones. 86% of these schools took part in the event. £3,000 to be used for further public engagement was distributed among the … Continue reading
The Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) agreed to support I’m a Scientist over 3 years through to the end of 2017. Each year, they fund 9 zones across the UK and Ireland. Part of the arrangement is that we include RSC members in five of our general zones to show school students the full breadth of science. Here is a summary of our main findings after evaluating the 9 RSC funded zones of I’m a Scientist, Get me out of here 2015. Scientists improved their science communication skills: They learned about students’ interests and how to communicate with them in a more efficient way. … there is no better way to test how much you know about something than trying to explain it to someone with a more limited background on the topic.” – Jesús Calvo-Castro, Spectroscopy Zone The zones saw a great number of conversations around chemistry themes with … Continue reading
In February 2015 we partnered with the Wellcome Trust Education to create the I’m a Scientist Learning Zone. In the Learning Zone teachers could send questions to and have conversations (thought text based live-chats) with neuroscientists and psychologists involved in research on a broad range of topics around the science of learning. The Learning Zone was successful, both teachers and scientists found it a valuable experience. We created a conversation between teachers and experts on the science of learning: 40 scientists and almost 300 teachers registered to take part. The Learning Zone site was visited by 7,000 users during the event. Pages in the Zone were viewed over 33,000 times. Scientists and teachers valued the event. 89% of teachers and 94% of scientists would participate again. Teachers improved their knowledge about the brain and learning. 66% of the teachers agreed that “their understanding about the brain and/or learning had improved”. Improving … Continue reading
In June 2014, teamed up with The Genome Analysis Centre (TGAC) to run two Big Data themed zones: The Genomics Zone and the Bioinformatics Zone, each featuring at least two TGAC scientists. And these were our main findings: The students were interested in the scientists: Students read the scientist profiles and asked about the research of each individual scientist. They were also very keen to learn more about the scientists; daily lives and hobbies, as well about their opinions on topical issues like animal testing. Students were interested in Genomics and Bioinformatics: Two difficult subjects which many of the students might not have been familiar with before the event. In fact, one teacher in the Genomics zone said she was pleasantly surprised with the level of the students’ questions and how the scientists explained what genomics is. The Bioinformatics and Genomics Zones exposed students to the new trends in biology: … Continue reading
The CHRISTMAS LECTURES are a series of science talks, which have been held at the Royal Institution (Ri) since 1825. In December 2013, the Royal Institution teamed up with us to extend the discussion around the CHRISTMAS LECTURES, and give everyone the opportunity to ask questions to real scientists online. This was the first time we ran an I’m a Scientist zone alongside the CHRISTMAS LECTURES, so evaluating it was particularly important: we wanted to look at the strengths and weaknesses of the event and suggest improvements for future editions. These were our main findings: Almost 600 people participated in the CHRISTMAS LECTURES Zone, of whom 78% were students, 8% were teachers, and 14% were members of the general public. All of the teachers that answered our feedback survey agreed that we should run the CHRISTMAS LECTURES Zone next year. The two scientists who we interviewed after the event said … Continue reading
In November 2013 we run I’m a Scientist in Ireland for the second time. We run 4 zones: two themed on Nanotechnology and Space and two general zones named Helium and Lithium with a mix of 5 scientists. This report looks at how the event went. One of the main points of the report is our analysis of the impact that the event had on students’ perception of science. We found out that students’ interest in science and science related careers is clearly increased after taking part in I’m a Scientist. We also report on teacher and scientist feedback, which was generally very positive. As one teacher said: “This event offers the opportunity to do something different; an activity that brings out new strengths and abilities”. Sandra Byrne. Teacher Download the report here.
Nearly 7,000 students received close to 10,000 answers to their questions in the June 2013 event. But what did students ask? What were the most popular topics in live chats? What did your students teach the scientists? Have a read of the summary for teachers to find out…
Back in November 2012 we ran I’m a Scientist in Ireland for the first time. In short, it was a real success. The enthusiasm shown by teachers, students and scientists was magnificent and the students really got into the spirit of the event. The full evaluation report is up on the Irish site (imascientist.ie/2013/05/15/evaluating-im-a-scientist-in-ireland/) alongside a short summary of our findings. In summary, we would love to run more events in Ireland.
Summary: Gallomanor was approached by the Wellcome Trust to run a live version of I’m a Scientist as part of the Wellcome Trust / Barbican Wonder Season in conjunction with the BNA Festival of the Brain in March and April 2013. The deliverables were: 2 Weekender heats Final in Barbican Cinema One with a paying audience IAS Zone to accommodate questions submitted by public during weekender. Gallomanor delivered the events but a lack of questions from the public outside of the events meant we did not need the IAS Zone. The events were a great success. The Weekender heats had capacity audiences; the final was sold out. We succeeded in recruiting excellent scientists, but it was harder than expected. We had to do more cajoling and encouraging than originally anticipated. This surprised us as we expected that more scientists would be keen to join in a Wellcome Trust event. Key … Continue reading
I’m a Scientist, Get me out of here is an online activity where school students get to meet and interact with scientists.
It’s a competition between scientists, where the students are the judges.
Students challenge the scientists over intense, fast-paced, online live Chats. Then they Ask the scientists all the questions they want to, and Vote for their favourite scientist to win a prize of £500 to communicate their work with the public.