Civic and Citizen Science | Projects | DesignLab

Researchers and citizens of Twente working together

Getting the citizens of Twente more involved in science is the topic of this program developed by the University of Twente and the Province of Overijssel. Doing research together with citizens enriches science, and at the same time citizens gain more knowledge about important social issues, such as health, sustainability and livability.

In this program, researchers have set up and conduct scientific research together with local communities. This program deals with issues that matter to the society of Twente. The first call was in spring 2023 and five projects started in September that year.

Both citizens of Twente and researchers from the University of Twente (UT) have submitted a proposal for a research idea on which they would like to work together. Research ideas could be about a variety of topics: new innovations and technologies, but also sustainability, health and well-being, livability in urban and rural areas, housing or biodiversity and nature restoration. There must be a clear link to Twente. Learning together by doing research plays a central role in this program.

The first projects started in September 2023:

Positive health in Boekelo, Usselo, and Twekkelo
Positive health solutions for tackling loneliness among the elderly in Twente
Citizen Science Dashboards: communicating climate change challenges in agriculture in Twente
Children and (geo)citizen science for climate-adaptive cities
AbilityTech: advancing assistive tools to enhance the self-sufficiency of people with disabilities

find here updates of our different PROJECTs

Positive health in Boekelo, Usselo, and Twekkelo

Marjolein and Sandra are both citizens of Boekelo. They decided to work together after they met at a session on Positive Health.
Their goals are to involve the citizens of Boekelo, Usselo and Twekkelo in activities that make them more vital. After submitting their work, they were introduced to Anne Dijkstra. She is an assistant professor in Communication Science at the UT.

Positive health solutions for tackling loneliness among the elderly in Twente

Researcher Jodi Sturge and Jeroen, who dedicate their time and work to combatting loneliness in the area with foundation ‘Samen1Twente, Samen1Enschede’ and ‘IkKanWelzijn’ are working together on a project about how to prevent social isolation through design. They both bring a different perspective to the project. Jodi is more focused on the design engineering through the lense of positive health, and Jeroen is focused on the citizens and destigmatizing the conversation on social isolation.

Citizen Science Dashboards: communicating climate change challenges in agriculture in Twente

This project touches on discovering how data can help farms to adapt to challenges posed by climate change, such as unpredictable weather and longer growing seasons. We sat down with Iris and Florian from Faculty of Geo-information Science and Earth Observation to talk about their project in collaboaration with the ‘Herenboerderij Usseler Es’.

Children and (geo)citizen science for climate-adaptive cities

This Children Citizen Geo-science project is a collaborative project between the University of Twente and the International School of Twente. Representing the UT are Funda Atun and Javier Martinez from the Department of Urban and Regional Planning and Geo-Information Management at the Faculty of Geo-Information Science and Earth Observation. Funda is an associate professor in Strategic Spatial Planning with a focus on nature based solutions, climate change adaptation, societal resilience and disaster risk assessment and management. Javier is an associate professor in Urban Quality of Life and Inequalities with a special research focus on community well-being, intra-urban inequalities and mixed methods.

AbilityTech: advancing assistive tools to enhance the self-sufficiency of people with disabilities

Autonomy. It’s something most of us have, in different ways. Making your own decisions on where to go, what to do. Having the freedom to do this can be taken for granted. What if you don’t have the autonomy to do this? What if you can’t walk, move, or communicate the way you want? What if your day-to-day life is confronted with barriers?