The objective of REINFORCING is to become the ORRI (Open and Responsible R&I) central point of knowledge and expertise, easily accessible, up-to-date and tailored to community needs. It will do so by reviewing and exploiting the richness of 10 years of ORRI-related initiatives, including the RRI Tools database. It will make this know-how available in the REINFORCING One-Stop Source platform, together with new community-led resources, and pathways to support navigation through them. REINFORCING is committed to capitalize on EU-funded actions and the proven expertise of its partners in both the theory and the practice of ORRI implementation. REINFORCING will act as catalyzer of quadruple-helix community members, who will co-develop services, including policy recommendations; of ORRI-related initiatives (regional and EU), to support efficient cooperation and adaptation rather than replication; and of ORRI expertise through the creation of a European map of Ambassadors and Facilitators. A key focus is on financial support of institutional and territorial changes towards Fair Transitions governance through cascading grants. REINFORCING will award 96 grants dedicated to boost institutions scaling up their ORRI experience, and to incubate newcomer territories experimenting with ORRI for the first time. Mentoring and matchmaking services and training modules are part of the REINFORCING wide offer. Reducing disparities is also a key focus of REINFORCING. Three key gaps (Balkan territories, Open Innovation and Mission projects) have already been identified and addressed through specific actions, while the overall project contribution to their reduction will be thoroughly assessed. The engagement of the Global ORRI Network will guarantee wide international cooperation. These efforts will result in a number of medium and long-term impacts, such as over 150 sustainable, individual institutional changes and mainstreaming of excellent, open and responsible R&I across the ERA.

While most SwafS initiatives have contributed to strengthening knowledge and approaches to Open Science, few initiatives have explored and implemented an RRI approach to Open Innovation. MOSAIC will address this SwafS knowledge base gap, exploring how to translate the involvement of stakeholders “from all parts of the quadruple helix”, typical of SwafS and RRI, in Open Innovation ecosystems, within the context of a mission-like environment focused on climate neutral and smart cities priorities. Drawing upon the richness of SwafS experiences so far, MOSAIC’s research will lead to the assessment of effective instruments applicable to successful co-creation approaches in quadruple-helix Open Innovation pathways. While doing so, the MOSAIC consortium will define and assess indicators to measure impacts and transformative changes that are specific to this particular context, generating scientific publications as well as toolkits to be further used within future SwafS-like initiatives and beyond. Pilot actions in the cities of Brussels and Milan will test MOSAIC’s methodological approach and research actions throughout the project. The piloting process will produce concrete instruments and recommendations, to be replicated in further European cities and regions willing to engage in mission-oriented approaches via quadruple helix collaboration, but also to enrich the work of Horizon Europe researchers and stakeholders more broadly.

There are no recognized standards in science journalism and communication, nor principles or indicators of quality. And yet they are needed, particularly in a moment when science communication is more than ever a key factor in facilitating democratic deliberation and in fighting misinformation. To fully benefit from a digital society, citizens need to feel that the information they receive responds to their needs and is useful to face and solve their problems. The climate crisis, the recent pandemic and many more global challenges can only be dealt within a framework of policies and actions properly informed by science, allowing all relevant stakeholders to decide and act on the basis of evidences and not of noises and misinformation. ENJOI will explore and test engagement as a key asset of innovation in science communication distributed via media platforms, with a strong focus on journalism. Through a combination of methodologies and in collaboration with producers, target users and stakeholders of science communication, ENJOI will co-create and select a set of standards, principles and indicators (SPIs) condensed to a Manifesto for an Outstanding Open Science Communication. ENJOI will deploy a series of actions via Engagement Workshops, Labs, field and participatory research, evaluation and testing phases.It will also build an Observatory as its landmark product to make all results and outputs available to foster capacity building and collaboration of all actors in the field. ENJOI will work in four countries: Belgium, Italy, Portugal and Spain, taking into account different cultural contexts. ENJOI’s ultimate goal is that of improving science communication by making it more consistently reliable, truthful, open and engaging. Contextually, ENJOI will contribute to the active development of critical thinking, digital awareness and media literacy of all actors involved in the process.

The overall objective of CO-VALUE is to boost uptake and deployment of research results by adopting a co-valorisation approach that strengthens the role of societal actors in knowledge valorisation. Citizen engagement will be embedded in knowledge valorisation by deploying capacity building, peer learning actions and experimentation. CO-VALUE will capitalise on and contribute to EU initiatives such as the Knowledge Valorisation Platform, through the production, testing and improvement of best practices and lessons learned in two European territories: Alicante in Spain and Emilia Romagna in Italy. In each territory, quadruple-helix stakeholders from the research & innovation ecosystem will be involved in the co-design and implementation of co-valorisation, exploiting ongoing knowledge valorisation processes such as developing innovative solutions to address the lack of raw materials and its impact on citizens’ welfare (Alicante), or specific funding schemes and projects to introduce multi-stakeholder engagement in public-funded research (Emilia Romagna).The transfer of best practices and skills will be guaranteed by a comprehensive scheme of capacity building, peer learning and shadowing opportunities, both at local and international level. The involvement of umbrella organisations such as EBN, ERRIN and universities alliances will foster a wider uptake of CO-VALUE’s trainings and tools, thus supporting the implementation of new practices by knowledge valorisation agents beyond the project consortium. Incentives for researchers to engage with society, and for society to engage with researchers will be co-designed with stakeholders in each territory and implemented throughthe involvement of local R&I public administrations. Tangible changes in local co-valorisation agents will be exploited to showcase improvements, together with a co-assessment of enabling conditions, processes and impact performed together by all stakeholders involved.

We live in an increasingly fragmented and unequal society. Democracy is in crisis, and mistrust in science is on the rise, yet the unprecedented challenges we face, such as the climate and biodiversity crises, require greater scientific literacy and engagement across society. Education needs to provide the scientific knowledge to engender engaged and informed societies, but also to equip learners with the holistic competences to support and motivate them to become courageous thinkers and doers, actively shaping their own futures. We urgently need connected, system-wide responses that incorporate varied perspectives, are empathetic to different stakeholders’ needs and centre social justice and care. To achieve this, we need models for education that are more flexible and inclusive and advance lifelong learning to empower all citizens. LEVERS delivers Learning Ventures, a replicable model for expansive science learning through multi-stakeholder regional partnerships that collaboratively explore challenges and design science learning experiences to address local issues. In 9 Learning Venture demonstrator regions, stakeholders from formal, non-formal and informal education across education levels, community organisations, research and innovation, industry, and government, will be supported to adopt a systemic design approach to create climate justice projects offering meaningful real-world learning experiences. Capacity building and a mentoring programme will offer role models and guidance within and between regional Learning Ventures, linking R&I with education. The LEVERS Learning Framework and Field Guide will enable the partnership model to be adapted for other regions and challenges. Professional learning programmes and Open Schooling resources will enable widespread uptake from youth and adult educators. Guides for industry engagement, business models and policy recommendations will ensure transformative impact on science education in Europe into the future.