In March 2020, the Grantham Institute organised an embedding engagement day with the Real World Science network (RWS) in Nottingham. The NERC funded activity brought SSCP DTP cohort 6 researchers together with the museum partners to build relationships between museums and research, deepen RWS partners understanding of climate knowledge, and to discuss how research links to collections – and therefore how the collections can be used to communicate climate science. The event also focused on defining aims for a future public engagement programme involving DTP researchers and museums.

This activity is seen as a first step in a broader scheme, with a long-term aim to create a UK-wide engagement programme involving academics, PhD researchers and museums, marrying public engagement expertise with the latest NERC research in order to engage large and diverse audiences. Representatives from each of the NERC DTP2s were invited to the event to build collaborations between RWS members. Future collaborations may include collaborative projects, student internships based at museums or direct engagement between researchers and audiences.