The first ever winners of The Impact Awards, organised by Unico, were announced
last week at an award ceremony designed to recognise and celebrate the impact of
innovation.
The joint winners of the Research Councils UK (RCUK) sponsored award for Public
Policy and Service Impact won their awards for development of a tool to convert
educational psychologists' complex reports into easy-to-interpret 'Learning Needs
Profiles' and an initiative to improve health and reduce health inequalities.
The three award categories: Business Impact, Environmental Impact and Public
Policy and Service Impact recognise and celebrate the process of transferring knowledge
and expertise from the research base of higher education and the public sector for
the wider benefit of society and the economy.
Ros Rouse, RCUK Head of Policy and Strategy, who presented the award on behalf
of RCUK, said, "UK research has a huge impact on people's lives and the economy
and these awards play an important role in celebrating that. Our support underlines
the ongoing commitment from the UK Research Councils in working together with the
research community to promote innovative research as recognised by these awards."
Speaking of the award winners, Chair of Unico, Professor David Secher said, "These
awards celebrate the success of knowledge transfer and exemplify ground-breaking
innovations being driven by knowledge transfer. These projects have the capacity
to make a real difference." He continued, "In this time of recession it is particularly
important that we celebrate the achievements of successes such as these."
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Notes
Contact:
Lee Willmott
Unico Communications Officer
Tel: +44 (0)1223 422085
www.unico.org.uk
Winners of The Impact Awards were announced at the Unico Conference Gala Dinner,
Brighton Racecourse, on Thursday evening, 11 June 2009.
For more information on The Impact Awards
visit the website.
Public Policy and Service Impact Award, sponsored by Research Councils UK
The winning entries (joint winners) are:
The Learning Needs Profiler© from Sancton Wood School/Anglia Ruskin University
The Learning Needs Profiler (LNP) © developed in close collaboration between the
University and the School provides, firstly, a tool for converting the complex information
contained in an Educational Psychologist’s report into an easy to interpret ‘Learning
Needs Profile’, and secondly, by linking issues identified on the profile to systematically
reviewed interventions, with clear information concerning the empirical evidence
supporting that intervention.
IMPACT – the International Health Impact Assessment Consortium, and IMPACT+
from The University of Liverpool
IMPACT's mission is to improve health and reduce health inequalities by advancing
Health Impact Assessment (HIA) nationally and internationally. HIA is "a combination
of procedures, methods and tools by which a policy, program or project may be judged
as to its potential effects on the health of a population, and the distribution
of those effects within the population" (European Centre for Health Policy/WHO,
1999). HIA produces evidence-based recommendations to inform planning and decision-making.