I actively contribute to public engagement/outreach activities, e.g. I conducted in-person (pre-COVID; March 2020 at Scoil Chliodhna Community National School) and virtual primary school visits (for Science Week, Nov 2020) (Making Fun Paper Circuits, An Introduction to Electronics) and was a host for Transition Year students via the HighTechElec Transition Year Work Experience Programme where students got hands on experience in the materials science lab (Feb and March 2020).
My children and I (July-Aug 2020) contributed to a “Tyndall Science at Home” video (https://www.tyndall.ie/tyndall-science-at-home) to celebrate John Tyndall’s Bicentenary and to show families simple home experiments that can be done during lock-down.
I was invited to interview (Dec 2020 – Jan 2021) as part of a careers supplement for the Irish Examiner newspaper (https://www.pressreader.com/ireland/irish-examiner/20210115/282604560491177 ), for the Sligo Champion newspaper (https://www.independent.ie/regionals/sligochampion/lifestyle/dr-keeney-flies-the-flag-for-women-in-stem-39888561.html) (Dec 2020) and for Irish Tech Central (https://www.techcentral.ie/focus-on-research-dr-lynette-keeney-tyndall-national-institute/ ) (Dec 2020). I gave social media interviews for International Women’s Day and Mother’s Day (March 2020).
I also contributed to press releases highlighting my successes e.g.: https://www.tyndall.ie/news/tyndall-receive-funding-from-sfi-frontiers-for-the-future-programme-valued-at-53-million/ and https://www.sfi.ie/research-news/news/royal-society-fellowships/
My focus is to encourage people to think actively about science and technology to appreciate the challenges that researchers face, to realise the importance of innovation, the opportunities it can bring and to understand the relevance of research to their daily lives. Positive interactions between researchers and the public are important to how the public views scientific research and enable the public to realise our skills and value, thereby generating support for science and technology research activities.