Gatekeeping the boardroom—this is getting a little old, isn’t it?

Truly inclusive governance requires going beyond seeking out diverse perspectives—it requires active efforts to foster an inclusive environment. An organisation’s culture needs to be reflected in its advisory board, especially as the board’s role is, in part, to hold the organisation to its values. Unfortunately, boardrooms don’t have a great track record for being inclusive. So creating an inclusive boardroom might mean we have to throw the boardroom out with the bored-water… 

Welcome, INCLUDE+ Research Fellow Alicja Pawluczuk!

Greyscale photograph of the head and shoulders of a woman with short, light-coloured hair. She is wearing a dark top and spectacles.

This month we welcome a new Research Fellow to the INCLUDE+ Management Group. Dr Alicja Pawluczuk has over a decade of experience in co-designing, facilitating, and evaluating digital inclusion, digital literacy and ICT-enabled and/or focused education programmes in the UK and internationally. She brings with her experience working on both high-level digital development programmes as well … Read more

Living labs: meeting in the gaps

Exploring the value of living labs as a meeting point for people and organisations, while challenging the idealisation of living labs as a neutral space.

Containing the impact of living labs

Are living labs a useful apparatus for continuing the legacy of the INCLUDE+ network following the project’s conclusion in five years’ time? In this post, my aim is to show how a living lab’s limitations positively define the shape of its impact—if a living lab can be anything, how can you be sure your living lab becomes something?

Five lessons for meaningful conversations: learning from co-creation in design

In this blog post, I’ll share how you can create space for meaningful conversations, learned in the context of co-creation.

Lab4Living  is a living lab in Sheffield working alongside communities to develop solutions in design, healthcare and creative practices. I spent some time with Joe Langley, lead Research Fellow, and Ursula Ankeny, Design Researcher and PhD student, at the lab’s space in Sheffield city centre.

Learning our ABCDs? Reflections following a brief study of asset-based community development

Georgia Brennan-Scott is exploring living labs methods and practices. Her research will inform the legacy of the INCLUDE+ network, hopefully culminating in a living lab of our own. Asset-based community development (ABCD) rejects a needs-oriented approach to community development i.e. assessing communities based on what they are lacking and where they are failing. ABCD calls … Read more

Join our team!

Are you a postdoctoral researcher looking to work for a leading research institute? Do you want to apply your skills, knowledge and expertise to tackle digital inequality in society? Are you a digital practitioner or digital creative with an interest in collaborative and interdisciplinary work? The School of Media and Communication invites applications for a … Read more

INCLUDE+ launch!

Welcome to the website for INCLUDE+, a five year project funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council! From September 2022 our network will begin to build a knowledge community around in/equalities in digital society that will comprise industry, academia, the public and third sectors in response to the UKRI Equitable Digital Society theme. … Read more