Whether you are new to outreach, or an experienced practitioner, we are here to support you to engage different audiences with the chemical sciences.
What is public engagement?
"Public engagement” is an umbrella term that describes the variety of ways organisations, teams and individuals seek to involve the public in their work. At the RSC, public engagement is defined as an activity that aims to do one or more of the following:
Inspire, involve and inform the public
Actively listen to the public’s views, concerns, and insights
Work in partnership with the public to solve problems, drawing on each other’s expertise.
We use the term outreach to define an activity that inspires young people, along with their families, when making their education and career choices.
Why do public engagement and outreach with the chemical sciences matter?
Public engagement and outreach can play a vital role in the chemical science ecosystem by:
- supporting a diverse chemical science community in the student body and the workforce, through schools and community participation and outreach
- improving policy development through public voice
- strengthening research and innovation through public participation
By bringing the chemical sciences closer to people’s lives and people’s lives closer to the chemical sciences, our public engagement and outreach work contributes to strategic priorities in education, voice and influence, inclusion and diversity and sustainability, and enables RSC members to achieve public engagement and outreach related goals.
Engaging with the public has really helped me to grow my confidence, including in seeking and processing feedback from my peers on how to approach different people and describe things in different ways.
"The experience has given me more self-assurance to undertake projects from the design stage to completion, both with a team and individually. I feel more able to give seminars, talk about my work to non-scientists, and go to poster sessions, and not just shy away. I have also met some lovely people who I will definitely stay in contact with!"
What do public engagement and outreach look like?
RSC members and grant holders engage with the public through several RSC funds and programmes. We work with members and partners to support best practice public engagement and outreach through training, funding, guidance and evidence.
Learn more about how the RSC community has been engaging the public
Discovery Planet CIC
Since 2014, Discovery Planet CIC (RSC Outreach Fund grant holders, 2024 RSC Inclusion and Diversity Prize winners) has been working to engage their community, in the heart of Thanet, with how chemistry is contributing to developing responses to global challenges, and routes into the chemical sciences. Over twenty years, Discovery Planet CIC has engaged over 25,000 people in an area containing multiple deprived neighbourhoods through workshops, events and exhibitions. They have employed innovative approaches to engaging special educational needs schools and unaccompanied child refugees.
Learn more in our Prizes and Outreach Fund pages.
RSC Analytical Science Community North East Region
In 2022, the RSC North East Region Analytical Community was awarded an RSC Outreach Fund grant to develop and deliver an event in collaboration with Alnwick Garden, “Poisons in the Garden”. They went on to win the RSC Inspirational Committee Award in 2023. Through the development of new and engaging resources (including videos, chromatography activities, story boards and a sensory lab), over 2,200 visitors were engaged over one weekend in July 2022. The story boards created during the project have an ongoing legacy and are being used as part of the Alnwick Garden Drugs Education Programme for young people.
Find out more about the RSC North East Region Analytical Community
ChemBAM
ChemBAM is an award-winning outreach project established in 2017 to increase the public’s confidence in discussing chemistry. The ChemBAM website is home to a whole range of free resources, experiments and interactive activities to support teachers and learners. In addition to the website, the ChemBAM team have delivered teacher CPD sessions, workshops in schools and created ChemBOXes. In 2023, ChemBAM was awarded the RSC Inclusion and Diversity Prize for their work in developing chemistry activity for people with visual impairments, learn more about this project here
If you would like to learn more about our community’s activity, see the case studies on our RSC Outreach Fund page and our Community News articles.
Are public engagement and outreach for me?
Our members get involved with public engagement for various reasons from enjoyment and a desire to inspire, to skills development (including communication, project management, grant writing and collaboration) and gaining new experiences.
Read why some of our members value public engagement
Through engaging with the public, I developed the ability to communicate complex chemistry topics to people with varying levels of scientific understanding.
"I also learned to be resourceful in overcoming last-minute challenges. As a recent graduate and early-career research chemist, this experience has been invaluable in supporting my professional development, boosting my confidence in sharing information with new people in an engaging way."
Being able to speak in front of large audiences and to interact with all ages and abilities also helps me improve my teaching skills, which are essential for my career as a university lecturer.
“Through my public engagement work, I have met dozens of scientists outside of my field, these people are fantastic sounding boards for new ideas I have in my research group – complementary skills make for great collaborations!”
Find out more in our Members Area
Join us to get access to the content mentioned above and find out about other benefits of our memberships.
Financial support through our Outreach Fund
This fund is available members, non-members, individuals and organisations to enable you to run chemistry-based public and schools engagement activities. If you are looking for funding for an activity in the UK or Ireland (up to £10,000) see our Outreach Fund guidance and deadlines to find out more and see if your idea is eligible.
Chemistry Week 2024 - celebrating chemistry throughout November
4 - 10 November 2024
This is an annual celebration of the chemical sciences. For 2024, Chemistry Week will be taking place 4 – 10 November, but we invite you to celebrate the chemical sciences throughout the whole month of November within the theme of “chemistry is shaping the future”.
The impact of chemistry is incredible, from reducing our carbon footprint, improving nutrition, and creating sustainable materials, chemistry drives positive change in all aspects of life. Chemistry is all around – it shapes the manufacture of all that you touch and wear, the development of life-changing medicines and solutions for the pressures on energy and water to help us to live more sustainably.
Within the chemical sciences there is a rich and diverse community of groups and individuals who, driven by dedication and professionalism, are using chemistry to shape the future.
We will be concentrating on celebrations during Chemistry Week itself, but we invite you to organise activity at any time in November to celebrate the myriad of ways that chemistry has, and continues, to shape the future for the better, themes could include (but are not limited to):
- Clean air/water
- Clean energies
- Sustainability
- Climate and environment
- Careers in chemistry
Share with us how you will be celebrating Chemistry Week in November – tag the Royal Society of Chemistry on social media and use #chemistryweek.
As usual, we want to support you with outreach and public engagement activities that you want to plan for Chemistry Week throughout November. We want to help you to inspire the next generation, reach new audiences outside of the chemical science community and celebrate the diversity of chemistry and people within our community.
Find some ideas
Not sure where to start? We’ve got you covered. Take a look at the:
- our Chemistry Week 2024 news article
- projects funded through the RSC Outreach Fund
- resources in our Outreach Resources Hub
- diverse careers in chemistry that contribute to our society
- latest news from the chemical sciences to see how chemistry is improving our world right now
Not sure where to start?
If you are still not sure where to go from here, don’t worry! Get in touch with us using the details on this page, we would be happy to hear from you and help support you however we can.
What else is in public engagement and outreach?
Evidence
Explore our evidence-based reports relating to the engagement of non-scientific audiences with the chemical sciences.
STEM career guidance
All young people must get the highest quality career guidance. See our resources to support career talks in schools.
Helping educators to inspire their students
Find out about our enrichment activities and competitions and meet local education coordinators.
Public attitudes to chemistry
The first in-depth study on how the UK public thinks and feels about chemistry, chemists and chemicals.