We’ve now completed the design framework for our Participatory Science Programme, which you can read here.
This work has been enabled through a Heritage Lottery Fund grant received by RECRI partner, the Cateran Ecomuseum, and inspired by success of their 2023 River Detectives project.
As we explained in our previous news post, Finding Common Ground, RECRI aims to build local involvement and engagement and bring in further local expertise as the initiative develops. This first design stage has developed an architecture for the Programme, which we now need to attract funding for delivery over an initial five year period.
The aim is the the Programme will be managed through RECRI partner Blairgowrie & Rattray Development Trusts’ Biodiversity Blair project, building on existing work by local people with SISI, the Scottish Invasive Species Initiative and other projects Biodiversity Blair is involved with. It will aim to offer training and support to collect a range of data-sets relevant for measuring and understanding biodiversity, water quality, functioning physical processes, such as abstraction, hydrology, impoundments and barriers and other important data sets such as pollution and the impact of extreme weather.
Engaging with interested volunteers can be a powerful tool and have wide ranging impacts, not only on local communities, but also the environment and science itself. For local volunteers it can lead to a feeling of ownership and pride for their local area, and the development of a deeper understanding of the process of scientific investigation and how it helps to inform management decisions at community, regional and national levels. The environmental benefits of participatory science include an increased awareness of environmental issues among volunteers that may encourage them to change their behaviour and champion environmentalism within their social networks. For researchers, scientists and environmental managers participatory science represents a cost-effective means of carrying out work, be it data collection, or physical labour, that can help increase the scope and ambition of projects and lead to effective Monitoring, Reporting & Verification of nature restoration initiatives.
