British Science Festival 2025

The British Science Festival will take place in Liverpool from the 10 - 14 September 2025 and will be hosted by the Liverpool John Moores University and the University of Liverpool. Read their statement below to find out more about applying to take part.

We are now accepting proposals from University of Liverpool and Liverpool John Moores University staff for the British Science Festival 2025. Apply here. The deadline for proposals is 23.59 on 4 December. 

The British Science Festival will take place in Liverpool from the 10 - 14 September 2025, and will be hosted by the Liverpool John Moores University and the University of Liverpool. 

The programme showcases cutting-edge science, technology and ideas that challenge, inspire and excite audiences. Each year, thousands of people come together to celebrate the latest developments in research and engage in open discussion about issues affecting our culture and society. 

Every year, a significant part of the Festival programme features events proposed by staff from the host university(s). This is a rare opportunity to showcase your research at a national festival with the British Science Festival as we shine a spotlight on the Liverpool City Region.  

Previous exciting events from host universities at the British Science Festival have included: 

A trick of the eye - a series of interactive demonstrations using eye-tracking technology, revealing the various tricks that our eyes, and their movements, play on us to construct the world around us. 

Sonic adventures – a workshop playing with some of the complex technology used to better understand sonic movement and discover how we might perceive our surrounding environment through sound.  

AirSavers Odyssey  - a board game designed to explore the complexity of air pollution, its effects, and potential solutions. 

Baby brain – an interactive exhibit in an immersive environment that mimics the perceptions and environments of children through real life data collection from infants monitored in their day-to-day environments. 

The Museum of Consciousness - a host of stimulating subjective experiences, including thought experiments, sound journeys, and dream incubations that help you tap into your consciousness. 

The World Turned Upside Down – performance of a play about dementia 

Mudder on the seafloor – a cocktail and craft evening focused on minerals found in the seafloor. 

We especially encourage proposals that involve research working or partnering with community groups, particularly those from across the Liverpool City Region. 

We celebrate the widest range of science topics and welcome applications from all disciplines including STEM subjects, social science, arts and humanities. We also welcome applications from non-research staff including professional services or support staff. 

Apply here. The deadline for proposals is 23.59 on 4 December. 

What are we looking for? 

We want the Festival to encompass a whole range of different topics and formats to ensure that we attract the widest possible audience. We encourage you to propose ideas which are creative, different and collaborative. 

In particular, we are looking for events which are: -  

• targeted at an adult audience (age 16+) 

• participatory and interactive. We anticipate that the vast majority of events in the 2025 programme will use a range of participatory formats, besides talks and lecture-style events, and will take place outside of a traditional lecture-theatre setting. 

• involve collaboration between disciplines, the two host universities, and/or with communities and partners from across the Liverpool City Region. 

• engaging, inclusive and novel 

• aware of the societal impact of the research being showcased 

We will also be looking for evidence that the proposal; 

• considers the practicalities and scope of delivering the event 

• considers whether the event would run across one instance, a day, or multiple days 

• considers a specific target audience or group 

The British Science Festival can support small funding requests for external event contributor fees, materials or equipment though, as a charity, we ask that LJMU and UoL staff explore other funding opportunities first. We do not provide funding for travel or accommodation. Allocation of funding is at the discretion of the British Science Festival and will only be allocated to exceptional proposals where all the criteria are met. The amount available will depend on the scale and format of the event and any such costs might affect the success of your proposal. 

Once your proposal is reviewed, we will be in touch to let you know if it was successful or not. Should your proposal be accepted, we will: 

• Schedule a meeting to talk about the content and format of your event. We may suggest changes to reflect our audiences, venues, and Festival aims. This is a collaborative process and an opportunity for us to understand what you want to deliver and how we can support you, as well as to convey our experience and learnings from the BSF. 

• Work with a copywriter and yourself to provide a title, blurb and image to represent your event for the BSF programme. 

• Promote your event through our Marketing and Communications team, using websites, press resources/relationships and social media. We also appreciate when you promote your event through your channels and networks and will provide a digital pack to support this. 

• Send you a logistics form and risk assessment to fill out and schedule a logistics meeting to ensure that your event runs as expected and that you have everything you need to run your event. Please note that completing these forms is required in order for your event to go ahead. 

• Send you a speakers form, to get details on you and your group for press opportunities. 

• Send you a demographics form, which is anonymous, which helps us to understand if our event contributors reflect the local demographic and target audiences of the Festival. 

• Offer you a free, day-long training event in public engagement during the Summer of 2024, where experienced coaches will guide you through inclusive best practice of public engagement and work closely with you on your event and how to make it accessible and attractive to different audiences. 

• Complete evaluation of your event and the overall Festival. You will be sent feedback specific to your event as well as have access to the finished evaluation report when it is finished in early 2026. 

Please note, we will not be able to: 

• Support on-the-day delivery of your event's content. While the BSF will ensure that the pre-agreed infrastructure is in place and that there's staff on hand to help with crowd management and logistical trouble-shooting, we are unable to be involved with the direct delivery of your event's content. You will need to make your own arrangements if you require staffing support for the set up and delivery of your event. 

• Source/produce every item you need for your event and take over the planning of all the logistical aspects of your event, beyond the reasonable infrastructure available at each venue. We will talk about responsibilities when we meet, but you will be expected to look after the production of non-standard requirements for your event.