Bringing Dundee Together: an interdisciplinary public engagement hub: Innovation and Impact Development Fund Report

Public Engagement helps universities to create new ways of co-producing, accessing, and sharing knowledge. There is, however, no single path to successful engagement with local communities. Time scales, funding, communication skills and equitable power relationships are some of the challenges that these forms of partnerships face. ‘Bringing Dundee Together: an interdisciplinary public engagement hub’ is a pilot project funded by the IIDF to explore how trusting relationships can be built between the University of Dundee academic community and external Dundee-based partners such as community organizations, practitioners, and policy makers. The Hub concept was based on the principle of a ‘University without walls’, a model in which the university is perceived to be part of the community and therefore a place to be accessible for groups from culturally and demographically diverse contexts. The pilot project has developed: 1. An illustrated infographic describing the conditions that will support strong partnerships that improve engagement with local communities experiencing health inequalities; 2. Initial first steps in building a model of collaboration with the community that will gradually build the foundation for an interdisciplinary Public Engagement Hub on health inequalities, and 3. The identification of strategies to build training in engagement for staff and students, and 4. A series of drawing images on the key principles/structure/vision of this Hub