Broadening the engagement of young people in environmental science

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Funded by the UK’s Natural Environment Research Council, the BEYOND project is connecting young people living in ‘cold spots’, places with limited access to green spaces and higher education, with their school, natural environment, and local university. The project aims to create ‘stepping stones’ for young people to connect with nature with a view to further engagement, e.g. through positive behaviour change, volunteering options, educational opportunities, or professional careers.

The project is based in Woughton Parish in Milton Keynes, involving Woughton Community Council, The Parks Trust, environmental scientists from The Open University, communicators, and an inclusive artist.

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Denbigh Geography students help to map future research priorities

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Denbigh students and teachers have helped to inform future priorities for floodplain-meadows research.

Members of the Mitti Matters Team. L-R, Vicky Bowskill, Emma Rothero, Yoseph Araya, David Gowing and Richard Holliman, The Open University, UK.

Why did we engage with students and teachers from Denbigh School?

The Natural Environment Research Council, also known as NERC, funded staff from the Open University to work with practitioners, community groups and local schools, to explore an aspect of green infrastructure, floodplain-meadows research.

The project is called ‘Mitti’ Matters. ‘Mitti’ (मिट्टी), Geeta Ludhra identified this key concept during the early stages of the project. Mitti is the Panjabi word for soil. Geeta Ludhra explains the significance of mitti in more detail in this post.

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Talking hay while the sun shines

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Dr Geeta Ludhra, exploring the smell of hay.

Dr Geeta Ludhra, Dadima’s CIC.

“Ah, Mitti Matters!” Dr Geeta Ludhra was responding enthusiastically to my clumsy attempts to explain the value of floodplain meadows.

‘Mitti’ (मिट्टी), Geeta explained, is the Panjabi word for soil. The word ‘mitti’ evokes ancestral land memories for many first and second-generation British South Asians like Geeta, through family histories and nostalgic stories that the elders carried with them from the Motherland. It can hold a deep spiritual and inter-generational dimension of Panjabi folk traditions and celebrations of festivals like Lohri and Vaisakhi.

And Mitti really does matter to Geeta, her identity, her family history and her connections to landscapes. Once Geeta had explained this to me ‘Mitti Matters’ had to be the name of our latest project.

In late May 2024 colleagues from the Floodplain Meadows Partnership and the Open University had the pleasure and privilege of walking with members of the Dadima’s Community Walking Group and other walkers as a contribution to Mitti Matters.

Alongside Geeta, Open University ecologists (David Gowing, Vicky Bowskill and Emma Rothero) helped me to plan our walk together. Emma, David and Vicky led the walk on the day, sharing scientific and cultural information, and answering questions.

A group of walkers and scientists in a hay meadow.

Walkers from Dadima’s CIC, and scientists from the Open University, in a hay meadow. Credit: Sivi Sivanesan.

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Identifying, disentangling and reflecting on traditions in science communication

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Professor Richard Holliman, The Open University.

Professor Richard Holliman, The Open University.

In early May 2024 I visited the University of Aberdeen. Colleagues and I from the international PCST Network reviewed sites for the biennial conference that’s scheduled for 27-29 May 2025.

During the course of the visit I presented in a symposium on the themes of the forthcoming PCST Conference (Traditions, Transitions and Tensions) alongside old friends from the EU-funded project ENSCOT, Melanie Smallman and Declan Fahy.

My contribution to the discussion of the themes of the forthcoming PCST Conference explored traditions in science communication.

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To Astrobiology and beyond: exploring our collection on OpenLearn

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Photo of Dr Ann Grand, The Open University

Dr Ann Grand, The Open University

Astrobiology is (to slightly mis-quote Douglas Adams) ‘… big. Really big. You just won’t believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly, big it is’.

For AstrobiologyOU, the research group that I’m part of, it’s not enough to study life on Earth and in space.

Not enough to look here and on other planets and their moons for evidence that life exists or might have existed.

Nor even enough to explore the environments that support, could support or might once have supported life on Earth or elsewhere in the Universe.

If you would like to know more about the work of AstrobiologyOU and the people who are doing it, please explore the Astrobiology Collection or visit the AstrobiologyOU website.

The AstrobiologyOU Logo

The AstrobiologyOU Logo

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Reconstructing past ocean physical properties

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During the summer holiday, I took part in a research placement with Dr Pallavi Anand in the School of Environment, Earth and Ecosystem Sciences at the Open University, organised by the Nuffield Foundation. The placement involved coding a MATLAB toolkit to a more accessible program such as Python that would use paleoclimate data to solve for past seawater temperature, oxygen isotope and salinity.

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