Science shops offer or mediate different ways in which you can gain insight into science or specifically into research at the University of Vechta. Are you interested in a particular topic? We will be happy to find out for you who is doing research on it at our university or in our networks. In citizen science projects, you can participate in research yourself. Public events organised by the Science Shop and the University of Vechta present research projects and results and invite you to expand your own knowledge. As a science shop, we also get involved in regional events and present research projects there or offer opportunities for participation.

Citizen science means that you as a citizen can participate in research. Depending on the project, you can participate in different steps of the research process, for example together with scientists and other volunteers you:

• set up a research question,
• develop an appropriate method to answer the question,
• collect data,
• analyse the data,
• reflect on the process,
• and finally prepare the research results, so that they are interesting, understandable and useful for specific target groups.

If you have a research idea, please feel free to contact us.

You may have a question with local relevance or another concern that you would like to explore further. Perhaps you notice that there is no data from the region on a certain issue, but it would be necessary in order to make informed decisions. You don't need to have a perfect research question or even a method yet, just talk to us and together we will think further about how to get to the heart of the matter.

Feel free to contact us if you would like to propose a topic or a concrete question for student research projects or papers.

Since summer 2016, Science Shop Vechta/Cloppenburg offers a seminar in which groups of students conduct research on regional issues or develop concepts for practice partners. The seminar addresses essential approaches and concepts of transdisciplinarity and "Responsible Research and Innovation" as well as practices of participatory research and science shops. The students then cooperate with partner institutions like civil society organisations, municipal institutions, educational institutions or companies. Our students have different subject backgrounds and thus work in interdisciplinary research groups.

The aim of this seminar is for science to help address regional societal challenges. If your topic is well suited to be addressed in this seminar, we will consider it for the next possible implementation.