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The £1.25 million ESRC Impact Acceleration Account (IAA) will help UCL apply social sciences research to challenges in society.
IAAs provide dedicated funding to maximise impact from research through knowledge exchange activities.
UCL has received £1.25 million from the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) for 5 years from 1 April 2023 to 31 March 2028.
We plan to use this funding to create a dedicated programme of activities to support our social sciences researchers to generate impact from their research.
We aim to enable researchers to maximise the benefit they gain from knowledge exchange, partnerships, training, commercialisation, entrepreneurship and policy and public engagement.
UCL’s IAA is managed by UCL Innovation & Enterprise.
Supporting social science researchers to make an impact
The ESRC IAA will be used to support a number of activities focused on generating impact from social science research.
These activities will include:
- two stages of knowledge exchange funding (starter and advanced)
- secondments and micro-residencies
- development of innovation networks (collaborations bringing together businesses and/or civil society with UCL academics to address user-defined challenges)
- policy engagement
- dedicated support for researchers looking to commercialise their research
- a doctoral training programme for entrepreneurship
These will be complemented by specialised support offered to researchers by the UCL Innovation & Enterprise’s Knowledge Exchange team.
Find out more about the funding calls and how to apply.
ESRC Festival of Social Science
As a recipient of IAA funding, UCL will be one of the partners of the annual ESRC Festival of Social Science.
This UK-wide event celebrates social sciences through public debates, conferences, workshops, interactive seminars, film screenings, virtual exhibitions and much more.
UCL will use ESRC funding to deliver a co-designed programme of live-events and performances as part of the festival.
Find out more about the Festival of Social Science and the events taking place on the Festival website.
Innovation and impact support at UCL
UCL has an established infrastructure for supporting innovation and impact, funded through UKRI's IAAs, the Higher Education Innovation Fund (HEIF) and other sources.
These include:
- sector-focused business and innovation partnerships support
- support for engagement with public policy (including the Research England funded Capabilities in Academic Policy Engagement project)
- public and community engagement, including capability and capacity development
- entrepreneurship training, with specific programmes targeted at doctoral students.
- support for consultancy and commercialisation including social enterprise via our subsidiary companies UCL Consultants (UCLC) and UCL Business (UCLB)
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