A joint initiative between the Research Councils and a number of local government organisations has highlighted the benefits of linkage between academic researchers and local policy makers - making the most of research outputs and encouraging their use by local services.
On 10 November 2005, LARCI will host an education based seminar entitled Research for Education - Making a Difference at the Local Government Association in London. The seminar will promote a broad view of current education themes emphasising the implications for local government, and will provide a forum for local practitioners to discuss education policy and its application with academic researchers.
The Local Authority Research Council Initiative (LARCI) is a partnership that facilitates better informed research to influence better policy making - with a direct impact upon the lives of the public. LARCI policy themes assist local authorities to respond to central government’s directives and cover crime, education, the environment, transport, health and social equity; sustainable development is a core LARCI theme.
Funded by the Research Councils and the Local Government Association, LARCI is now promoting a range of world-class research designed to transfer the benefits of research into everyday life.
Dr Andrea Turner (LARCI's Research Co-ordinator) says: "This seminar highlights how LARCI’s multi-disciplinary work offers academic researchers the opportunity to discuss their research with local authority end-users, ensuring that the results reach the people who can use them to make a difference. Conversely, through LARCI local authority researchers and policy makers are given a channel through which to influence the direction of Research Councils funded projects and programmes relevant to local authorities, now and in the future."
LARCI works mainly through a series of seminars, newsletters and a web site. The objectives of LARCI are: to respond to policy issues identified by local authorities by promoting relevant Research Council funded research; help local authorities to meet their challenges through access to quality research; help Research Councils, local authorities and representative organisations to develop strategic partnerships, and to encourage others to follow similar routes.
Practical examples of LARCI's work include promoting a Natural Environment Research Council project to examine how to optimise de-icing and road weather systems with several local authorities in the UK and abroad, helping local authorities to develop sustainable transport strategies. Economic and Social Research Council funded studies into inclusive schools, Medical Research Council funded research into public health and housing, and a Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council study into the control of food borne pathogens are also promoted by LARCI, and the Natural Environment Research Council has contributed on soil, environment, coastal impact and water quality issues. Other research includes the Rural Economy and Land Use programme through which the social sciences are harnessed for sustainable rural development, and LARCI also liaises with the Improvement and Development Agency on local government issues.
LARCI promoted output includes a Youth, Citzenship and Social Change programme that examined the way in which young people make the transition to adult life. The Economic and Social Research Council funded programme on Care, Values and Future of Welfare studied parenting and future social policies has also been promoted (report available).
Recently, LARCI has facilitated discussion on an Innovative Health Technologies study as well as projects into urban security via surveillance methods.
LARCI also helps disseminate the results of larger projects funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council. The DAPPLE Project on Dispersion of Air Pollution and its Penetration into the Local Environment provides new insight into the relationships between traffic on city streets and the high levels of noxious gases and particles to which members of the public are often exposed in the roadside environment. In the DAPPLE Consortium six universities combine their multidisciplinary expertise working in partnership with Westminster City Council, Transport for London, and other local and national stakeholders. Steve Neville of Westminster City Council and Dr Roy Colvile of Imperial College London compared academic and local authority perspectives within DAPPLE at a recent LARCI seminar where some of the first results to emerge from the project were presented.
DAPPLE has revealed, the current regulatory regime for roadside air quality monitoring and emissions controls ignores many parameters and phenomena over which local authorities have influence. By better identifying pollution hotspots, cycleways and pavements can be re-sited, street furniture moved, and traffic controls altered. DAPPLE results show how these initiatives that local authorities can make relatively easily are more effective at reducing the public's exposure to airborne pollution than current assessment tools would suggest.
Using such examples of collaborations, LARCI promotes the research benefits of partnership between academics and local authorities, and the benefit to the citizens such authorities serve.
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Contact
Matt Goode, Media Officer
Research Councils UK
Tel: 01793 413299
Dr Andrea Turner, Research Co-ordinator
LARCI
Tel: 01793 413121
Notes for editors
About LARCI
LARCI works to facilitate knowledge exchange between the Research Councils and local authorities. This is mutually beneficial - to local authorities, as they benefit from, and can have input into, world-class research; to the Research Councils, as they ensure that funded research has practical applications. LARCI comprises representatives from the Research Councils, local authority bodies (including LARIA and LGA) and central government (including ODPM and IDeA).
About Research Councils UK
Research Councils UK (RCUK) is the partnership between the UK's eight Research Councils. Through RCUK, the Research Councils work together to champion the research, training and innovation they support. The Research Councils are independent non-departmental public bodies, funded by the Science Budget through the Office of Science and Technology.
RCUK was created to increase the collective visibility, leadership and policy influence of the Research Councils; to stimulate multi-disciplinary research that encourages collaboration; to provide a single focus for collective dialogue with stakeholders and to encourage greater harmonisation of internal operations.
The partnership is led by the RCUK Executive Group, which meets monthly and comprises the chief executives of the eight Research Councils. The Group is currently chaired by Professor Ian Diamond, Chief Executive of the Economic and Social Research Council.
The eight UK Research Councils are:
- Arts & Humanities Research Council (AHRC);
- Biotechnology & Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC);
- Council for the Central Laboratory of the Research Councils (CCLRC);
- Economic & Social Research Council (ESRC);
- Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC);
- Medical Research Council (MRC);
- Natural Environment Research Council (NERC);
- Particle Physics & Astronomy Research Council (PPARC).