Community Festival 2024: your chance to get involved

Our Community Festival returns to campus this year, on Saturday 18 May 2024, following a successful launch in 2023.

The Festival supports our Strategy principle of being an Engaged University by bringing together local residents, alumni, community groups and small businesses for a family-friendly programme of live music, theatre and performance, community stands, crafts, street food, and research activities.

If you have an idea for an activity for the Festival, or if you have some research to showcase, here’s how you can get involved. 

Community activity

Colleagues who work with the local community, and community organisations, can submit a proposal via the online community activity expression of interest form.

The organising team wants to feature a broad range of community initiatives again this year.

On offer in 2023 were sensory activities, painting, theatre, music and sport workshops, and a SportsPark open day.

Deadline: midnight on Monday 12 February. 

Research activity

Colleagues with a research activity proposal should complete the online research activity expression of interest form.

One of the objectives of the Community Festival is to attract a wider audience to engage with our research, including different age groups and people who may not have visited campus or interacted with the University in any way before.

Activities should therefore showcase a research topic or project in an engaging and interactive way for a non-expert audience.

The 2023 Festival featured hand-on activities, children’s talks, research presentations, and multilingual storytelling.

Deadline: midday on Monday 12 February.

Allocations of space at the Community Festival will be decided based on ensuring we have a broad variety of activities and involvement from a diverse range of our University and local community. 

The Community Festival organising team will respond to everyone who has completed the form in the week commencing Monday 19 February to confirm whether you have a space.

Visit the Community Festival website to see highlights from 2023.

If you have any questions, please email either the Community Festival organising team or the Research Communications team.