This week Tsinghua University has incorporated the Educational Module Resource (EMR) on the public engagement of science into their postgraduate module, Innovation and the Development of Science & Technology. The aim, as specified by the module leader, Professor Zhengfeng Li, was to give students ‘a more comprehensives understanding of innovation’. Students’ feedback confirmed that the content of the EMR helped them to be more sensitive about how to approach and communicate ‘unknown unknowns’ in emerging science.
The EMR is a key deliverable of Dr Joy Zhang’s ESRC project, Governing Scientific Accountability in China. It is co-funded by the University of Kent and the ESRC. The pilot 7 lectures are arguably the first attempt to develop an educational resource on public engagement training that speaks to Chinese particularities. It aims to provide modular teaching resources and to fill the gap of public engagement training in Chinese science curriculum.
Earlier this month, sections of the EMR have also been integrated into Yantai University compulsory module, Dialectics of Nature, which is taken by more than 500 postgraduate students across science and engineering majors. Later this year, sample lectures will also be delivered at the Beijing Institute of Technology, the Beijing University of Chemical Technology, as well as in a number of research institutions of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Currently, all adaptation of the EMR into existing Chinese university curriculums are delivered or supervised by Dr Miao Liao (CASTED, China’s Ministry of Science and Technology, co-author of the EMR lectures) and Professor Lu Gao (Chinese Academy of Sciences, EMR China Coordinator). This pilot run of the EMR is expected to generate valuable insights on institutionalising public engagement education in China. Professor Gao and Dr Liao will share their findings next February at Dr Zhang’s project conference, Governing Trust in the Biosciences: Institutional and Cultural Change, at the British Academy in London.
Further information:
- The Student Version of all pilot 7 lectures (in Chinese) can be accessed online
- Dr Joy Zhang, Senior Lecturer in Sociology, profile