Professor Non Eleri Thomas, founder and Director of Swansea University’s Centre for Children and Young People’s Health and Well-Being, will be participating in a new Universities Pairing Scheme which will see her paired with Aled Roberts AM.
The Beacon for Wales’ Universities Pairing Scheme, launched in October and endorsed by the Royal Society, has been set up to help forge direct links between Assembly Members, senior civil servants and academics/ research scientists within Welsh universities.
The scheme aims to give policy makers more direct contact with Welsh Universities and raise awareness among academics of how policy is developed. It will forge links for politicians and civil servants with Wales’ leading academics across science disciplines, business, social sciences and humanities.
So far, 14 Assembly Members have signed up to the scheme but this is the first pairing with Swansea University. Aled Roberts’ top priority area is Children and Young People and therefore, given her expertise, it seemed an obvious choice to pair him with Non.
Professor Non Eleri Thomas said: “I am delighted to be paired with Aled and I look forward to exploring ways of raising the profile of children’s health and well-being. This is also an ideal opportunity to demonstrate the novel multi-disciplinary research we are undertaking in the Centre, including: health promotion, childhood obesity, physical activity, mental health, and health inequalities. I am also looking forward to discussing with Aled best practice for dissemination of important research findings and to consider how our research can better inform and influence the development of policy.”
The Scheme will see AMs/senior civil servants and academics spending two days together. Academics will have the opportunity to shadow the AM/civil servants which might include spending a day at the AM’s constituency office with an opportunity to observe a session of the AM’s surgery, or attend meetings, events, plenary session in Cardiff Bay so that the academics can experience how policy is developed. In return, the AMs/civil servants shadow the academics in their working day, visit the academic’s research facilities and meet with staff and students to hear about the latest research that is taking place.
