Tom Avery

Local Challenges Research Office – How Swansea University Involves Communities in Place-Based Research and Evaluation

Tom will talk about how researchers can use their expertise to understand local manifestations of societal issues and facilitate community-led projects that make a local difference. Rather than research being led by pure academic interest, Tom will discuss how research can be driven by local relationships and the co-ordination of macro and local evidence around the needs of communities that are representative of places. This is the kind of impact-driven research supported by the Local Challenges Research Office, a new capacity at Swansea University which uses place-based approaches to put communities at the heart of research through Educating, Co-Creating, and Advocating with and for our local places.

Biography

Dr Tom Avery is a Research Officer at the Local Challenges Research Office at Swansea University. He supports and conducts research that addresses local, regional, and global challenges through collaboration with local communities. He has developed co-creation principles to guide this work and is currently planning community listening events across south west Wales to identify ways for University research to make a bigger difference locally.