Introduction

Science in the City (SitC) is Malta’s only national Science & Arts Festival and part of the European Researchers’ Night (ERN) initiative. This event helps engage, empower and enable children and youths to consider STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) careers.

In 2021, the festival went hybrid over 24–25 September. The theme of the festival was "Sowing seeds". It emphasised the importance of science and research in everyday life towards responsible active citizenship, which is becoming ever more important in a world that is undergoing monumental changes, as both the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change have shown us.
In 2021, SitC concentrated most of its activities on the Sowing Seeds theme, acknowledging the fact that each and every one of us can make a difference. We are that much closer to creating a better world: environmentally, politically, and economically, if we develop our ability to think critically, join forces with scholars to address today's problems, and make an active decision to seek that change. All of these elements contribute to a higher standard of living. As always, we hope to engage new audiences through scientific research projects, theatre, music, dance, exhibitions, installations, and other kinds of arts.

This European-wide festival of science and research takes place in over 350 towns. The SitC Consortium will involve the general public in a Science and Arts event in Malta. 'Taking Root' will be the subject for 2022, and it will expand on what we've been attempting to achieve in recent years, namely, emphasizing to citizens the importance of science and research in fostering engaged, responsible citizenship. This is in a world that is undergoing massive transformations.
If our mission succeeds, this would improve creative and critical thinking abilities in Malta, as well as in other countries around the world. We believe that these abilities enable us to make deliberate, reflective changes. This holds true in any field, from the arts and sciences to ethics, the environment, and politics.

What are the problems/issues being addressed?

These are the issues we are looking to explore with the festival are:

1. What role does the citizen play in the conservation of the environment?
   
   
2. What roles do the arts have in bridging the gap between citizens, industry, scientists, and policy-makers? Where can research play a role in this process?
    
3. Can storytelling help in conceptualizing a more sustainable future that merges science and culture?
   
   
4. How can the Maltese people contribute to Europe’s green transformation?
   
   
5. How have changes throughout the history of the Maltese Islands shaped the state of our environment today?
   
   
6. What role does our culture and history play in our collective environmental consciousness?
   
   
7. What is the importance of critical and creative thinking skills in the development of active citizenship when it comes to our public identity, concerns, and political environment?
   
   
8. How does an improvement in the environment contribute to the well-being of society (physically, psychologically, spiritually)?

Why is it important for society?

In 2021, the festival’s projects brought together members of our communities, researchers and artists, to engage citizens about the importance of science and research in fostering engaged, responsible citizenship.   We are interested in artworks around research concerning engineering, social sciences, neuropsychology, inclusive economy, health, language and education. In fact, these topics are really important for society as they take a big part of our everyday life. It is then important for citizens to understand the role that they can take in it.
Society understands the stakes and the issues that we have to face, and what could be done to address them. But the information is not accessible easily to everyone, and by reaching an audience through the festival, a lot more people could be aware of the issues, and what they can do to face them. Also, science information is sometimes out of reach for some people and is more accessible through a festival that communicates science in an “easy” way for a large scale target audience.  

It is important for people to understand that research is accessible to everyone and is also important for societal and modern issues. It shows that everyone can play a role in these issues. Also, for the young generations, it is important to show them that science is an open door for every student who’s interested and for every gender.

What are the overall objectives?

The Aims/objectives of the festival are:

1. To show how science is part of everyday life, researchers are people with extraordinary job and that researchers in Malta are having a positive effect on daily life.
   
   
2. To demonstrate that science can be fun, interesting and exciting and can lead to a rewarding career for any gender.
   
   
3. To develop art inspired by a scientific concept or idea, especially local science. Researchers should be consulted, preferably having an active role in the project. The consortium will help with contacts and networking. To help find a researcher or artist do contact us directly.
   
   
4. To create interactive science-inspired arts projects which engage citizens and communities.
   
   
5. To be located in Valletta and in an online space. We ideally want activities that have a physical and online presence. We will also accept applications from activities that are purely online or real world.

What has been done?

Audience

The festival's audience is varied and comes from diverse backgrounds from Malta, Gozo and abroad. Our impact exercise has shown that the main audience is between the ages of 39 and 48, employed, has at least a bachelor's degree, is Northern European or White, and lives in a household in Malta that earns more than €17,305 per year. Respondents' primary motivations for attending the events were education, family time, and education. Respondents' most common follow-up action after attending the event was to look for further information elsewhere. A wide range of other socioeconomic profiles come to the festival including youths, teenagers, young professionals and pensioners from diverse backgrounds from highly educated to those with no formal qualification. In a survey run by MISCO in 2019 for MCST/Esplora, over 40% of people in Malta had said that they attended the festival.
Age

In 2021, our impact exercise identified the following age ranges. The sample was weighted towards age groups in the centre of the age range in 2021 when it came to respondents' age profiles. The age group 39-48 years (n=135, 38 percent) was the most well-represented, followed by 29-38 years (n=106, 30 percent) and 18-28 years (n=48, 13 percent).

Gender
In 2021, our impact exercise identified the following age ranges. In terms of gender, the group in 2021 was biased towards females (n=283, 76%), with fewer males (n=85, 23%). Non-binary respondents (n=3, 1%) were also present in tiny numbers.
Education
As we want to diversify our audience, 2021 statistics show a high level of university students/previous students. The majority of the respondents said they had at least a university degree (bachelor's, master's, including undergraduate and postgraduate degrees). A smaller part of the respondents were indicating other education or no degree qualification. These percentages show that our audience is becoming more diversified and that our major goal of having a broader audience is getting closer each year.

Attitude toward researchers
As a result of the event, respondents' attitudes toward research and researchers appear to have improved. Specifically, the proportion of respondents who indicated positive views toward research grew across all but two semantic differential measures, with a notable increase in perceptions of research as 'Exciting' (+9%). All but two semantic differential measures for attitudes toward researchers showed small improvements in favourable ratings, the largest of which was for perceptions of researchers as 'Important' (+4%).

The results of a study of respondents' impressions of research in 2021 also hint at positive post-event outcomes. Positive answers to statements about research and researchers increased after the festival across all metrics, whereas unfavourable responses fell consistently. In the lines, the positive impacts were clearly visible. 'With hard work, anyone can be a researcher and 'In general, I feel well educated in research' (+7% favourable responses for both).
Activities
In terms of activities, several types of activities were realized during the previous editions.  There were some pre-festival activities (8 in the 2021 Festival), mostly pre-festival workshops like CineXjenza: Sharklab (during which CineXjenza reveals the secrets of sharks and debunked the myths with short clips from Sharklab Malta) or Create Your Own Game: MissinTech Online Workshop (In this pre-festival workshop, MissinTech show the participants how to create a computer game from scratch.).
Then, during the real-world festival, theatres across the city will host a selection of events created to excite, inspire and entertain people of all ages. Citizens will be able to enjoy this vibrant celebration of science and art, featuring music, interactive plays, comedy, science shows and more. These real-world workshops were realized (10 in 2019), and a lot of them were science communication and engagement workshops. We can take, for example, a science poetry workshop during the SITC 2019 edition, or Meet the Researchers workshops that happen every year during the festival, in order to introduce researchers in a scientific field. Most of these workshops, like the Meet the Researchers workshop, included an introduction of the subject, a brainstorming session and a carousel discussion, including the participants as much as possible, to help them get into the subject of the workshop. Some workshops were realized in order to ensure that all the activities (exhibits, experiments, etc) that the organizations are doing meet the aims and values of the festival. These workshops would be very important, as the organization not attending them would not receive the DegreePlus Certification or funding for their exhibits. Even more important, it helps in identifying logistics issues that might occur, or just making clear that the organization’s workshops are on point and accessible to the public (in terms of technical issues like communication).

Then there is the live virtual festival that is only a click away for the citizens wherever they are. The virtual program includes the same exciting variety of events that have come to define Malta’s largest Science and Arts festival. Events like Our Warming Seas, in which people will see stunning videos of Malta’s waters, and hear from experts about the changes that are happening in the seas around our islands.

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