Citizen Science Lab
The Citizen Science Lab is a transdisciplinary expertise centre that brings together scientists, policy makers, citizens and other societal stakeholders in participatory research initiatives that produce new knowledge, address scientific questions of relevance to society, and provide data and insights on urgent societal issues that need to be tackled together.
Based within LURIS, the CS Lab acts as a facilitator and incubator of new co-created citizen science projects that bring science and society closer together, as well as a supportive knowledge hub for societal engagement practices across all domains of research.
The CS Lab also contributes to the field of practice by developing novel approaches to both researcher-led and community-led citizen science approaches, along with the tools and materials to support these. We additionally conduct research on the impacts and outcomes of such approaches, in collaboration with the Engagement & Inclusion Focal Area of the Centre for Science & Technology Studies (CWTS).
Citizen Science projects in Leiden
Local collaborations between Leiden University researchers, the City of Leiden, citizens' initiatives, and the residents of Leiden include the bottom-up BuurtKennis project, the annual Expeditie Stadsnatuur together with the Leiden Biodiversity Network, and the active canoe-based clean-up crews of the Grachtwacht.
Citizen Science projects at Leiden University
Ground-breaking citizen science approaches that have been developed by researchers at Leiden University include the highly successful Erfgoed Gezocht project, the Psychology Lab on Wheels, and the Citizen Science eDNA project.
Citizen Science projects with Dutch partners
Funding from the Dutch Research Council has made collaborations with other Dutch research institutes possible, such as the NestWacht project together with Naturalis and TU Delft, and the Lil'Scientist project led by the University of Amsterdam together with the IMC Weekendschool, NEMO, and New Scientist.
Citizen Science projects with European partners
Our collaborations with EC funding from the Horizon 2020 programme have aimed to strengthen public engagement with science in the SciShops and Open Science Hub projects, inclusive science communications in the GlobalSCAPE project, and the European citizen science community of practice in the EU-Citizen.Science project.
Current European projects include European Citizen Science to further strengthen the European community with the ECS Academy, and CitiObs to strengthen Citizen Observatories for community-based environmental monitoring.
