Making History
£9m
Research Centre
4
Collaborating Institutions
32K
Citizen Contacts
Our mission
The Centre for Digital Citizens (CDC) takes an inclusive, participatory approach to the design and evaluation of new technologies and services that support ‘smart; ‘data-rich' living in urban, rural and coastal communities.
We work with citizens and partners to co-design sustainable ‘Digital Social Innovations’ that ensure technologies applications support diverse communities and have long-lasting social value and impact beyond the life of the Centre.
Challenge Areas
The Centre for Digital Citizens focuses on
four critical Citizen Challenge areas.
Ageless Citizen
How can technology support non-age biased learning, growth and engagement opportunities across the entire life course?
Connected Citizen
How will future citizens remain digitally connected with each other, with public services and with the socio-political issues of the day?
Our Activities
Co-creation of research activities
The framework will use design-led ‘initiation mechanisms’ such as participatory design workshops, hackathons, community events, citizen labs, open innovation and co-production platform experiments to support the co-creation of research activities.
Our Activities
Engaged Citizen Commissioning Framework
Driving our programme to address these challenges is our ‘Engaged Citizen Commissioning Framework’. This framework will support citizens’ active engagement in the co-creation of research and critical inquiry.
Our Activities
Innovation Fellows
Our Innovation Fellows, postdoctoral researchers, will engage in a 24-month social innovation programme within the Centre for Digital Citizens. They will pilot Digital Social Innovation projects as part of highly interdisciplinary, multi-stakeholder teams.
Our Activities
Outcomes of the Centre for Digital Citizens
The outcome of these pilots will be the development of further collaborative bids, venture capital pitches, spin-outs and/or social enterprises. In this way the Centre will act as a catalyst for future innovation-focused Digital Economy activity.
"This Centre will allow us to explore how citizens and communities can be a part of the design of innovative technologies that work better for them, from finding ways to use shared personal data to creating citizen-led digital public services."
- David Kirk, Principal Investigator
Partners
