From the Nominator

"The Bond Newsroom team developed a strategy to increase the breadth of researchers providing expert commentary in the media and boost the profile of new and early-career academics, PhD students and experienced researchers in the university’s key research focus areas.   

Having established that one issue was academics lacking confidence in the relevance of their expertise and the ability to communicate effectively with media outlets, the newsroom took a series of actions to provide training, support and reassurance to academics and encourage their participation in external media. This included establishing a content partnership with the university’s local newspaper, The Gold Coast Bulletin, to publish a weekly expert opinion piece from a Bond researcher, hosting regular in-house Media 101 training sessions, facilitating training from The Conversation and providing support in the pitching and writing of expert commentary for The Conversation.    

In the 12 months to November 2022, The Conversation published 58 articles by Bond academics. Of 39 Australian universities using The Conversation, these Bond articles had the 10th best total readership figure of more than 7 million (double the previous year). In terms of average reads per article, Bond topped all universities. Considering that Bond University is Australia's smallest in terms of staff and student numbers, this is a significant achievement. Five Bond University researchers who had never previously been published on The Conversation have become regular authors as a result of our strategy."

From the Judges

The jury thinks this campaign was successful for researchers to share their knowledge with the public. We  believe that the initiative is effective, with clear and measurable outcomes, and admire the use of graphics and copy in the campaign. We also appreciates the campaign's collaboration with a local media outlet, which they see as a symbiotic relationship. Overall, the jury  views the campaign as a great concept that has achieved its goal with great execution.