Past Sessions

To find out more about the sorts of topics and ideas we explore at Interchange, take a look at the schedule of previous sessions below:

Achieving Impact Internationally - Wednesday 24th June 2026

Research impact is not limited in the type of research or the potential beneficiaries of the underpinning work. Similarly, the locale of the beneficiaries is not limited to the local region or nationally within the UK. International impact has the potential to significantly expand the sphere of influence of the underpinning research generated by academics. This seminar aims to highlight the breadth of Warwick's international research impact from across the facilities and to open discussions regarding best practice, as well as overcoming the unique challenges associated with generating international impact(s). This seminar is the first in the new series of interdisciplinary interchange seminars, hoping to provide support for and encourage open discussions regarding the multi-faceted nature of research impact.

Speakers:

Professor Emily Henderson (SELCS) and Professor Ann Stewart (Law School)
Dr Bronwyn Harris (Warwick Medical School)
Professor Alison Ribeiro de Menezes (SMLC)
Chair: Professor Tom Montenegro-Johnson

Professor Emily F. Henderson is Professor and Director of the University Research Centre ‘Doctoral Education and Academia Research Centre’ (DEAR), at the University of Warwick, and is located in Education Studies (SELCS). Prof Henderson’s current research projects include a 4-year project on institutional approaches to widening participation in India (‘WAHEI’ - ‘Widening Access to Higher Education in India, Institutional Approaches’) and she is also working on a strand of research about research centres. She is most recently co-author of the book Gendering the Massification Generation: Higher Education Access and Choice in India (Routledge, 2024) and  Making Sense of Academic Conferences (Routledge, 2023). She is co-editor of the academic blog Conference Inference and Co-Convenor of Diary Method Community, an online community of practice for diary researchers.

Professor Ann Stewart is a Professor at Warwick Law School. She is a member of the Centre for the Study of Women, the Warwick in India network and Africa hub steering committee. Her research specialises in gender and the law, focussing on issues of gender justice and postcolonialism. She has a particular interest in Eastern and Southern Africa and India. Ann was the Principal Investigator of the Fair Chance Foundation (FCF) project ‘A Fair Chance for Education: Gendered Pathways to Educational Success in Haryana” and is currently the Co-Investigator for Widening Access to Higher Education in India: Institutional Approaches (WAHEI), which is a 4-year research project (2022-26) that draws on and furthers the reach and impact of the initial project.

Dr Bronwyn Harris is an Associate Professor in Public Health within the Warwick Medical School. She previously worked in the Centre for Health Policy, Wits University, South Africa. Bronwyn’s research focuses on how technology can bring quality care to those who need it, regardless of who they are, where they live or their ability to pay. Alongside Professor Frances Griffiths, Bronwyn is Warwick Co-Investigator on the Remote Consulting in Primary Healthcare (REaCH) training programme, with King’s College London, and seven institutions in sub-Saharan Africa (funded by UKRI, Global Health Partnerships, NIHR). REaCH training enables health workers in sub-Saharan Africa to confidently deliver healthcare to their patients using mobile phones, and to integrate this digital delivery with their existing health care system and cascade training to other health workers. REaCH initially involved undertaking trials in Nigeria and Tanzania, with the programme since benefitting healthcare practitioners, patients and decision-makers in several sub-Saharan countries, including Ghana and Ethiopia.

Professor Alison Ribeiro de Menezes is Professor of Hispanic Studies in the School of Modern Languages and Cultures, and Deputy Chair (Research) of the Faculty of Arts. Her research focuses on art and the legacies of state violence in Spain and Latin America. She works closely with the international migrant theatre group Ephemeral Ensemble on physical theatre approaches to social justice and to working with global majority communities. Their award-winning play

REWIND has toured widely in the UK and Latin America, and was named one of the top 10 UK theatre shows of 2024. Alison and Ephemeral have also collaborated with theatre professionals in Colombia and Argentina, developing the co-production Kaukawith La Máscara Theatre in Cali.

2025-2026

Please see above for current content

2024-2025

Getting Started With Impact - Wednesday 6th November 2024

For the first edition of Interchange of the 2024-25 academic year join a panel of humanities and social sciences researchers who have recently embarked upon a journey to deriving impact from their research as they discuss the experience, what has worked for them, and answer questions.

Research impact is a well-established part of the UK higher education landscape. The term was first used by what is now UK Research and Innovation in 2008, with impact always having been a major component of the Research Excellence Framework. Impact is defined quite broadly as ‘an effect on, change or benefit to the economy, society, culture, public policy or services, health, the environment or quality of life, beyond academia’. Which perhaps explains why despite impact being such a vital part of UK university life many researchers find it tricky figuring out the first steps on their journey to deriving impact from their research. The reality is that each researchers’ journey to deriving impact from their research is individual, though there are tried and tested pathways and templates that can be followed, and it is not something which researchers need puzzle alone.

Speakers:

Dr Naomi Pullin (Department of History)
Professor Innan Sasaki (Warwick Business School)
Chair: Professor Fabienne Peter

Dr. Naomi Pullin is an Associate Professor in the Department of History. She is a historian of the early modern British Atlantic, with particular interests in the gender, religious and political history of Britain and its North American colonies. Her current project A Social History of Solitude in Early Modern Britain, funded by a Leverhulme Trust Early Career Fellowship, explores how time spent alone was understood, articulated, and experienced in early modern Britain. In 2023-24 she was a participant in the Faculty of Art's Future Leaders in Impact Programme (FLIP).

Prof. Innan Sasaki is a Professor in Organisation Studies at Warwick Business School. She is an expert in collective memory and traditions in organisations and fields. Her research intersects sociology and management studies to unveil how social and organisational changes take place in the encounter of tradition vs. modernity having studied long-living and heritage-based craft firms, refugees, and indigenous people to understand how they culturally survive in the changing institutional environment.

2023-2024

Schools- 14 February 2024

Schools are a popular first port of call for researchers embarking on their impact journey. And for good reason, because from the sheer satisfaction of seeing young minds expand and grow, through ensuring curricula and teaching materials reflect current thinking, to the critical role all facets of schooling play in advancing social justice, there are plenty of places where Arts and Social Sciences researchers can have valuable input. However, it is not necessarily an easy route to sail, nor do researchers always begin with the knowledge and skills they require to generate impact from collaborating and working with schools.This edition of Interchange explores what distinctive contributions Arts and Social Science researchers at Warwick are making through schools’ impact work. As well as asking what key principles are at stake in this space, and how can we ensure our research makes a meaningful difference?

Speakers:

Dr Paul Grigsby (Department of Classics and Ancient History)
Dr Rebecca Morris (Department of Education Studies)
Chair: Professor Chris Doran (Deputy Chair of the Faculty of Social Sciences)

Dr Paul Grigsby is a Research Fellow in Outreach and Impact in Classics and Ancient History. Paul runs the Warwick Classics Network, which was set up to promote the teaching of Classics in schools and to provide teachers with support and resources. Since its inception in 2018, the WCN has worked extensively with students and teachers to give them access to the latest research tailored to the school curriculum. Their work has led to several local schools introducing and expanding the teaching of Classics as a subject.

Dr Rebecca Morris is an Associate Professor in the Department of Education Studies. Her research interests include education policy, the teaching workforce, assessment and feedback, literacy and English, and widening participation. Becky is a current holder of an ESRC IAA (Impact Acceleration Account) project focusing on developing the implementation of evidence-based approaches to GCSE English and Maths resits, and informing policy debates around this topic. Prior to working in higher education, Becky was an English teacher in secondary schools in Birmingham.

Health & Wellbeing- 5 December 2023

Issues of health and wellbeing – from adolescent mental health, to empowering vulnerable communities in policy decisions - are at the forefront of many contemporary debates and research efforts. What distinctive contributions are Arts and Social Science researchers at Warwick making to improving health and wellbeing? What key principles are at stake in this space, and how can we ensure our research makes a meaningful difference?

Speakers:

Dr Fabiola Creed & ProfessorHilary Marland (Department of History)
DrMark Fabian (Department of Politics and International Studies)
Chair:  Professor Jerry Ahearne (Deputy Chair of the Faculty of Arts)

Hilary MarlandLink opens in a new window is a Professor in the Department of History and PI on the on the Wellcome Trust Investigator Award project ‘The Last Taboo of Motherhood? Postnatal Mental Disorders in Twentieth-Century Britain’, which explores changing diagnoses, treatment, and attitudes towards postnatal mental illness across the twentieth century, including the framing of the condition postnatal depression after the 1960s.Fabiola CreedLink opens in a new window is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow on the project, whose work focuses on narrative accounts, lived experience and media representations. Of postnatal mental illness. They have recently collaborated with Fuel Theatre Company and playwrights Courtney Conrad, Bryony Kimmings, and Sara Shaarawi on three audio pieces for a touring installation, which responds to their research. It will beat Warwick Arts Centre 4 – 11 November 2023 Link opens in a new windowas part of the Resonate Festival.

Mark Fabian Link opens in a new windowis Assistant Professor of Public Policy at Warwick and an Affiliate Fellow at the Bennett Institute for Public Policy at Cambridge. He works on wellbeing from an interdisciplinary point of view with a focus on policy applications. Since 2021, he has been working with the national anti-poverty charity Turn2us and their Edinburgh branch to coproduce, along with their service users, a wellbeing framework and associated theory of change to inform and enhance their work.

2022-2023

Environment & Sustainability- 8 June 2023

Addressing the climate crisis and generating sustainable solutions for society is at the top of the agenda for the university, the region, the nation and the world. What role can Arts and Social Sciences researchers play, and how can we ensure our contribution finds the right audience?

Speakers:

Pietari works in the field of Environmental Media Studies, focusing especially on green film and TV production. Pietari leads the AHRC-fundedGlobal Green Media Network(with Dr Hunter Vaughan, University of Cambridge) and has recently co-editedFilm and TV Production in the Age of the Climate Emergency: A Greener Screen,which features perspectives on green production, policy, digital infrastructure and audiences from mainland Europe to Zanzibar, from Colombia to the UK.

Caroline’s research area is the politics of climate change and of sustainable energy transitions. This entails in-depth explorations and explanations of the many ways in which politics and policy enable and/or constrain processes of decarbonisation in energy, and of the importance of delivering more equitable outcomes via sustainable transitions.

Chair:Professor Jerry Ahearne (Deputy Chair of the Faculty of Arts (Research and Impact))

Experiences of Engaging with Government & Policy- 1 November 2022

How do researchers go about engaging with politicians, policymakers, civil servants and other government groups? How can researchers build networks and reciprocal trust with this sort of audience, and how is change actually realised in this sphere?

Speakers:

Professor Richard Hastings (Centre for Educational Development, Appraisal & Research)
Dr Nikoleta Jones(Institute for Global Sustainable Development)

The key idea underpinning Nikoleta's research is that biodiversity conservation policies can be more effective when we incorporate the complexities of socio-ecological systems in policy decision-making. Her research assists practitioners to identify pathways for increasing public support for nature protected areas and promoting responsible behaviour by all users.

Richard and colleagues are working with a number of learning disability support organisations in multiple research projects, often in close partnership, sometimes directly co-producing research. All CEDAR’s research projects involve engagement with children or adults with learning disabilities or autism, or with their family members. We are also working directly with NHS England and Improvement in the Midlands region through an ESRC IAA current project and have connections over several years with policymakers in the learning disability and autism fields.

Engaging with Creative Practice- 24 May 2022

How can creative practice be a pathway to impact? How do you go about collaborating with creative practitioners, and what do they need from us as partners or beneficiaries? What makes a successful project of this type?

Speakers:	Dr Rachel Turner-King(Education Studies),Dr Bobby Smith(SCAPVC - Theatre and Performance Studies), and Charlotte Hale Smith fromFlux Dance.
Chair:	Professor Jackie Hodgson(School of Law)

Dr Rachel Turner-King and Dr Bobby Smith are deliveringActing on Climate, an ESRC-funded impact project using dance, drama and digital arts to introduce young people in Coventry to the often overwhelming, gloomy issue of climate change. They are working with local artists Flux, Lens Change, and Ashley James Brown. This work is part of an international project led by Professor Kathleen Gallagher (University of Toronto) entitled Global Youth (Digital) Citizen-Artists and their Publics: Performing for Socio-Ecological Justice.