Southampton Education School had a strong presence at the European Science Education Research Association (ESERA) conference in Denmark at the end of August. Most of the science education branch of the Maths & Science Education (MaSE) research centre attended, including three of our doctoral researchers, contributing to a vibrant programme of talks and discussions. With so many parallel sessions and networking opportunities, getting everyone together for a group photo was no small feat, but thanks to Ana’s determination, we managed it! Here’s a quick snapshot of our contributions: 

• Andri participated and presented in two symposia. The first symposium focused on key outcomes of the H2020 funded COSMOS project; Andri gave a talk on “Re-conceptualising open schooling as a means toward responsible citizenship through science education”, focusing on the theoretical framework of open schooling through science education developed through this project. The second symposium, with Nora as chair, presented work from the ESRC-funded collaboration with National Taiwan Normal University. Andri’s presentation focused on the use of socioscientific inquiry-based learning for climate change education and teacher professional development.  

• Neta presented findings from a participatory research project (with Ran) exploring unstructured interactions at Winchester Science Centre. 

• Ran shared research conducted with Neta on group strategies in an educational escape game and also served as a discussant in a session focused on escape games in chemistry education. 

• Wonyong shared a number of his recent projects and served as a discussant for a SIG8 (Futures-Oriented Science Education) symposium. 

• Ana presented part of her research with the title “Unlocking Perspectives: Exploring Initial Design Principles of Culture-Based Socio-Scientific Issues (CBSSIs) Training for Indonesian Pre-service Biology Teachers”. At this conference, Ana has been selected to receive the ESERA 2025 Fellowship. She got valuable feedback and networking throughout the conference. 

• Jingwen presented her doctoral research on the strategies employed by a kindergarten teacher to teach climate change adaptation within the Chinese community context, using inquiry-based learning to empower children as agents of change. 

• Keqin Presented his research “Practitioners’ Views on Utilizing Games in Science Museums” at the conference, exploring current uses of games in European museums as well as practitioners’ definitions and attitudes toward museum games.