2020-2025
2020 - 2025
Public Engagement for Better Policy
Date: 27th May 2025
The seminar focused on profiling a selection of existing practices and critically assessing the contribution of public engagement in policy to the goal of social solidarity across the life-course. It also reflected on the role of higher education in supporting public engagement processes as part of its evidence-to-policy mission.
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Making Research Decisions with Community Partners and People
Date: 1st May 2025
The workshop aimed to bring together researchers and community partners involved in, or interested in getting involved in, participatory research. It focused on exploring inclusive methodologies and shared decision-making when collaborating on research of mutual benefit. The session was open to everyone, with no prior experience or specific level of Public and Patient Involvement (PPI) required.
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Enhancing Knowledge Equity through use of Grounded Theory for Social Justice and Decolonisation Approaches
Date: 31st March 2025
The seminar focused on integrating inclusive research methods to enhance knowledge equity, with an emphasis on epistemic justice. Key topics included the history and development of Grounded Theory (GT) and its variant, Constructivist Grounded Theory (CGT), highlighting their application in social justice research. The session explored CGT's features, such as coding, theoretical sampling, and participant involvement, emphasizing reflexivity and co-constructive principles. Additionally, the seminar addressed the University's decolonising curriculum initiative, focusing on developing a toolkit to promote knowledge equity and fostering inclusivity in academic spaces.
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What Next for Irish Public Policy Development? Strengthening the Use of Data and Evidence
Date: 28th May 2024
The seminar focused on research and evidence as a key pillar in developing effective public policy and fostered debate about next steps in a vital and challenging agenda of change. It examined substantial work underway on strengthening approaches to policy development, implementation, and evaluation, and enhancing the impact of policy over the complete life course. The civil and public service reform agenda and the Research and Innovation Strategy Impact 2030 formed a key backdrop to the event.
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Doing Discourse Analysis: Research Strategies and Applications
Date: 25th April & 26th April 2024
Participants examined a series of concise case studies both successful and unsuccessful highlighting how academics sought to shape real-world policy. Senior policymakers then offered reflections based on their experience working with research in time-critical decision-making environments. The seminar built on a prior 2023 event on research impact and was developed in partnership with the university’s Office of Vice President for Research and Innovation.
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Achieving Impact through Policy Relevant Research - A Dialogue
Date: 21st March 2024
Participants examined a series of concise case studies both successful and unsuccessful highlighting how academics sought to shape real-world policy. Senior policymakers then offered reflections based on their experience working with research in time-critical decision-making environments. The seminar built on a prior 2023 event on research impact and was developed in partnership with the university’s Office of Vice President for Research and Innovation.
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Designing Research for Social Impact: Insights from Researchers, Community Organisations and Policy-Makers
Date: 20th March 2024
This gathering brought together academic researchers, representatives from community organisations, and policy-makers to explore the design, implementation, and translation of research into meaningful social impact. It offered a forum to discuss how collaborative and inclusive research practices can better serve societal needs.
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Unlocking the Potential of Empirical Research: An Introduction to R for Statistical Analysis and Data Visualisation
Date: 27th February 2024
Led by Luis Garcia-Covarrubias, a Postdoctoral Research Associate at the J.E. Cairnes School of Business and Economics, the session guided attendees through importing varied datasets, computing descriptive statistics, creating visualizations, and drawing meaningful inferences. Luis’s background includes roles as a Research Statistics Officer at University Hospital Galway and as Chief Data Officer for an NGO in Mexico and Latin America. His research interests span agricultural and environmental economics, and he applies econometrics and data science across fields like labour economics, education, and medical sciences. He has taught at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels.
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Learning from Experience: The Case of Irish Early Years Policy
Date: 15th December 2023
The keynote address was delivered by Dr. Fergal Lynch, former Secretary General of the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth (2015–2022), and previously Deputy Secretary General at the Department of Health (2012 - 2015). Respondents included Dr. Anne-Marie Brooks, Assistant Secretary of the ELC/SAC Division in DCEDIY and a key figure in Ireland’s First 5 strategy, Teresa Heeney, CEO of Early Childhood Ireland with extensive experience in child advocacy and governance and Dr. Sheila Garrity, Senior Researcher at the UNESCO Child & Family Research Centre and Lecturer in Early Childhood Studies, with over 25 years in community-based practice and academia.
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Community Collaborations: Building Research Evidence for Policy Impact Across the Lifecourse
Date: 28th November 2023
Two keynote speakers Prof. Linda Steele from the University of Technology Sydney and Harry Rutner of the Australian Centre for Disability Law framed the central question: How can we design, implement, and sustain research that authentically collaborates with communities, including older adults and people with disabilities, while also delivering evidence to inform policy reform? Professor Steele, a leading socio-legal scholar, has published extensively on disability, institutionalisation, and restorative justice. Rutner, a legally qualified social worker and disability rights advocate with over 14 years of experience, co-founded legal services in Western Sydney and recently represented civil society at the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities in New York in 2023.
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Living Through Covid-19: A Lifecourse Perspective
Date: 29th May 2021
We are delighted to announce a series of 6 weekly, free to public virtual conversations to be held and hosted by the Institute for Lifecourse and Society (University of Galway). Each week the virtual conversation, which will be free, globally accessible, and delivered across time zones to the public, will bring together the views of academics, policymakers and most importantly citizens directly affected by the coronavirus and living with its consequences. This will include a focus on kernel issues for children and youth, parents, older people, families, people living with a disability and communities as well as in differing cultural and international contexts. It is hoped the conversations will assist human understanding and compassion in relation to the coronavirus as well as proposed solutions for societies to connect and cope and become more resilient.
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Living and Learning Empathy in Covid-19: A Virtual Global Conversation
Date: 27th April 2020
As a contribution to help us understand the on-going impact of Covid-19 and ways in which we can all help respond now and, in the future, a series of 12 weekly National/International free to public virtual conversations will be held and hosted by the Institute for Lifecourse and Society (University of Galway) and The Global Network of UNESCO Chairs for Children, Youth, and Communities in collaboration with Penn State University. Each week the virtual conversation, which will be free, globally accessible, and delivered across time zones to the public, will bring together the views of academics, policymakers and most importantly citizens directly affected by the coronavirus and living with its consequences. This will include a focus on kernel issues for children and youth, parents, older people, families, people living with a disability and communities as well as in differing cultural and international contexts. It is hoped the conversations will assist human understanding and compassion in relation to the coronavirus as well as proposed solutions for societies to connect and cope and become more resilient.
