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Enabling public and community engagement through the Sussex Knowledge Exchange and Impact Fellowships
By: Nana Adwoa Yankah
Last updated: Wednesday, 2 April 2025
The Sussex Knowledge Exchange (KE) and Impact Fellowship Programme has been a beacon of progress for around 18 months, and while it is set to conclude in July 2025, the impact it has made is undeniable.
A highlight of the programme has been our Public and Community Engagement Fellowships, funded by HEIF for two cohorts, which have been instrumental in supporting academics involved in public and community engagement since 2023.
These fellowships have filled a crucial gap across the institution by providing small amounts of funding to foster meaningful collaborations with external partners across all disciplines.
A pillar for Knowledge Exchange (KE) activities
Public and community engagement is at the heart of KE activities. Working with external partners is vital, as it provides the knowledge needed to inform impactful research. Since its launch, the Public and Community Engagement Fellowships have been oversubscribed, reflecting the immense interest and demand from all Schools. This demand underscores the importance of these fellowships to help researchers navigate the complex elements of their impact work.
Addressing the gap
Despite unwavering efforts, Sussex’s position in the KEF 4 Results 2024 remains the same in the Cluster X average for public and community engagement. Feedback from the HEIF Faculty Focus group highlighted the variability of public and community engagement across disciplines, Schools, and Faculties. While there is some disappointment that KEF results do not fully reflect the efforts, our dedication to public and community engagement remains strong and the KEI Fellowships help to demonstrate these efforts further.
Illustrating demand and enabling impact
The demand for this scheme is evident; we received over fifty applications (valued at £169k) and were able to fund twenty fellowships (valued at £69k) which have enabled numerous projects under public and community engagement. Recipients have used diverse approaches of engagement to co-create and collaborate with their research users, sharing knowledge and expertise, exploring networks and understanding user reach.
The KE and Impact Fellowships, supported by the central KE and Impact Support Programme team (Research Initiatives), have provided University-wide support for developing relationships with external partners. This, along with a self-assessment of our public and community engagement activities, could positively impact our future KEF results as a broad discipline-based HEI.
We are highly encouraged by the display of positive feedback from some of our awardees:
“It is essential to have this available funding to further develop work, networks, outputs to ensure reach”
“Please continue these schemes”
“This has been invaluable at enabling me to maximise the impact of my research”
“This support has been vital to me personally and the Women in Refugee Law network”
“Great scheme, very supportive and hopefully money put in will benefit log term the uni by coming back tenfold!”
“It is good to have resources to focus on KE activities as it is not currently possible to spend money on research”
“The funding provided by KEIF has been essential to establishing our approach and building a growing profile. It is a highly valued resource”
“This was managed artfully and thoughtfully by the team; thanks especially to the team for the huge amounts of patience and flexibility they offered”