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Imperial’s Collaboration Kickstarter is supporting a new round of community research partnerships in Northwest London, while the newly launched Impact and Legacy Fund will help last year’s projects develop their early progress.

The 2025 Collaboration Kickstarter has connected Imperial researchers with local charities, organisations, and community members to deliver participatory research projects. These projects help to strengthen the connection between Imperial and the surrounding community, enabling us to collaborate, share, and learn from each other.

Robert Fish, Chair in Environmental Sustainability and 2025 Collaboration Kickstarter recipient, said: “The Collaboration Kickstarter is a great initiative. Not only does it fund a small number of projects that augment deep and early-stage public engagement in Imperial research, it also fosters a culture of institutional learning and best practice around participatory approaches.”

Meet the recipients of the 2025 Collaboration Kickstarter

There are seven successful recipients for the 2025 academic year. Among them are ‘Living Voices Northwest London’, which will co-design support for people living with and beyond head and neck cancer; Spotlight on Bacterial Vaginosis, a community-led advocacy project developed with local partners from , and a community-led project on sustainable urban transitions developed by and in partnership with Imperial’s Centre for Environmental Policy.

Other funded projects include one that will explore patient and public involvement in paediatric critical care, and another that will partner with White City residents to co-design a virtual nature experience for urban communities. Visit our website to read more about the full range of this year’s funded projects.

Carlos Izsak, community partner and 2025 Kickstarter recipient (Urbanwise.London), said: “We’re incredibly excited to be a community partner for the Collaboration Kickstarter. It means a great deal to us and our beneficiaries as it provides the opportunity to explore a partnership with Imperial and build on our existing work, strengthen our engagement with communities, and test new ideas.”

Looking back at the 2024 pilot

The Collaboration Kickstarter launched in 2024 as a pilot fund to support participatory approaches to research. From the start, the programme was designed to support new partnerships, highlight lived experience and help teams develop ideas that could grow into longer-term community research.

That long-term ambition is already taking shape through the progress made by several projects from the first cohort. One of these projects, ‘EDI Advocacy in Cancer Research’, started with the aim to establish a community-led advocacy group focused on equality, diversity and inclusion in cancer care and research. Since then, work linked to the project has contributed to the development of guidelines for reporting equality, diversity and inclusion in research, .

Introducing the Impact and Legacy Fund

This year also introduces the Impact and Legacy Fund, designed to help projects from the 2024 pilot year continue their collaborations and build impact. Two projects were awarded this fund, including ‘Swipe up or Switch Off?’. This project will partner with to co-produce an insights report on smartphone-related interventions to support young people’s health and wellbeing.

The second successful recipient is the ‘Break the Barriers’ project, which will continue its work to improve maternity care for Black, African, Caribbean and mixed-Black families. The shares the highlights from this project, including how lived experience partners helped to co-author a and how they are currently developing a partnership with the Northwest London Integrated Care Board, which is funding a maternity community advocate pilot.

Sarindi Aryasinghe, PhD candidate and Imperial Lead of Break the Barriers, said: "The Impact and Legacy Fund will deepen the trusted partnerships we have started to build through the initial Collaboration Kickstarter Fund, keeping lived experience voices at the centre as we take the next step together.”

The returning Impact and Legacy Fund recipients and new cohort of Collaboration Kickstarter projects will provide further evidence on how small-scale, community-based research can build routes to wider research, policy and practice impact.

To read more about the 2025 Collaboration Kickstarter recipients, visit our webpage. To keep up to date with opportunities from the Public and Community Engagement Team, sign up to the monthly Societal Engagement newsletter, or if you’re part of the local White City community join the White City Community Engagement newsletter.