The Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) funds thousands of research projects every year, generating important insights into social, cultural, technological, environmental and political issues. With a mandate to communicate why that research matters to people across Canada, SSHRC turned to Ascribe to create a series of engaging, easy-to-understand profiles showcasing the researchers and their work.

How Ascribe helped

The grants and fellowships offered by SSHRC allow researchers to conduct deep inquiries into the issues and challenges facing people, society and the world: everything from immigration and social justice to environmental sustainability to the rise of artificial intelligence and digital media. Communities, businesses and governments can then use the knowledge emerging from that research to improve people’s lives. SSHRC also oversees a number of programs delivered through a tri-agency partnership with the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council, including the Canada Research Chairs program.

As a federal agency, SSHRC has a mandate to share with the public information about the research it supports. To help showcase that work — and communicate the value and potential impact of the research on people and communities in Canada — over the past several years we have developed more than 60 short profiles of SSHRC-funded projects helmed by researchers across the country. For each profile, we review available background material on the researcher and their work, and tailor a questionnaire to enable us to capture the most interesting and relevant details of the work. We then interview the researcher to get the story in their own words. From there, we develop a clear and engaging profile that meaningfully highlights the importance of the research.

The research stories we have developed have touched on topics such as support for people with disabilities, the experiences of refugees and other immigrants, Indigenous approaches to math education and environmental science, health inequities faced by Black communities, housing programs for 2SLGBTQ+ youth, women’s participation in the film industry, and much more. The stories are published on SSHRC’s website and shared in the agency’s monthly newsletter, Dialogue, providing all people in Canada with an accessible look into some of the most compelling research being done today.

Deliverables: Research stories

Our process:

• Background material review
• Questionnaire development
• Content-gathering interview
• Writing and revisions