PASCAL has worked closely in recent years with a number of organisations concerned with community engaged research, namely research with communities rather than on communities. This strand of the conference will involve a co­operation with the UNESCO Chair for Community­-engaged Research and Social Responsibility based in Victoria (Canada) and New Delhi.

Professor Budd Hall is the chair of this strand and challenges contributors to this year’s PASCAL International Conference to submit proposals to suggest how universities and communities may be transformed through a community-focused approach.

Our conference is hosted by the University of Catania and supported by the city of Catania in Sicily. Catania is a frontier of Europe where issues of migration and job securing during a time of global economic decline are at the forefront of local thinking.

In his introduction to Strand 3: Engaging Communities and Universities in the Public Good, Professor Hall reminds us of the need to relate our research to current issues and writes the above as a primer for thinking about abstracts and papers you might submit.

Leone