The Chemistry Education Research Group (CERG) has had a difficult few years in the wake of COVID and the lovely people at RSC Networks have been working away in the background over the last year looking at how to help the group recover.
CERG has had a significant impact on the landscape of chemistry education research and practice. Over the last few years its flagship activities included those who were new to chemistry education research: the Teacher-Researcher scheme which supported those who were conducting classroom based research with money and support and the CERG mentoring scheme. Before webinars were a thing, CERG ran a webinar series, showcasing leading research from around the world, and supported the group’s de facto annual meeting, MICER.
These activities were all focussed on themes of networking and support, aiming to emphasise the presence of an ecosystem around inclusion and development in chemistry education research, including in practice-based settings.
Rebuilding
So there are lots of seeds from which CERG can resume and RSC Networks have done some work in exploring the level of interest among the membership. There is thankfully a lot of interest so the next task is to assemble a new committee from which we can begin to rebuild. RSC Networks have scheduled an online “Town Hall” meeting on 9th December for members, in which we will share some information about interest groups, and think about some next steps for CERG. I’ll be at that sharing what CERG has achieved in the past, and what the next steps might look like, although of course ultimately it will be The Committee that lead direction. Please do attend if you are interested; if not, RSC Networks will share updates, as will the RSC CERG website.
If you filled out a CERG survey earlier in the year and opted in to receive further information, RSC Networks will have emailed you details. If not and you are an RSC member who is interested, you can email networks@rsc.org to learn more.
