ARC West’s funding ended on 31 March 2026. This site is an archive and is no longer updated.
2 April 2025
We caught up with Lucy Condon and Carmel McGrath from our patient and public involvement team, to find out about their recent thank you event for public contributors.
Lucy Condon (LC): We wanted to say a massive thank you to all the public contributors and communities that we’ve worked with in 2024. Each person plays a huge role in shaping the work we do, and we couldn’t do it without them.
It seemed like the very least we could do was throw a little shindig. It’s just a lovely opportunity to get everybody together, allow people with a shared interest to meet each other, hear about what other people have been doing, and feel a little bit more connected.
Carmel McGrath (CM): Yeah, I couldn’t agree more. It was also a way to let people know about research happening around Bristol and the South West. And like Lucy said, creating a warm, welcoming and fun environment for people to just connect organically.
CM: We were fortunate to hold the event at the Trinity Centre in Bristol which is a lovely space. It’s a converted church with these beautiful stain glass windows. We had a big space for the event so there was plenty of room for the food and for people to sit at tables together.
We wanted to find somewhere to hold the event that was accessible and had good transport links. The team at Trinity were brilliant, they were so accommodating.
LC: I think more than anything we were all keen that we held the event in a community venue rather than a university space or a more commercial space. Hosting at Trinity really added to the atmosphere.
CM: In fact, the public contributors we work with actually recommended Trinity. It’s important to ask people what they want and when is the best time to hold these events. It’s a collaborative process.
LC: We had lots of things going on. We were keen to make it a celebration event, not just your standard ‘let’s just hear from so and so about what they’ve been doing’ type affair.
We did have speakers talking about the projects they’ve been involved in and how they worked. Having these presentations helps with connecting people and enables them to feel more like part of a community. It’s also just fascinating to hear about!
We had Dr Harriet Fisher talking about her work on HPV vaccinations, designing information for children and young people. We had Common Ambition talking about the amazing work they’ve been doing around HIV testing. We also had Professor Jonathan Rossiter presenting on his fantastic work on robotics, which I think equally entertained and terrified everyone.
We had Jikoni providing the most amazing food, who were so lovely and accommodating! Who could forget Dovetail Orchestra (including our very own Pippa Craggs), which was hands down the highlight of the day. They were incredible! Looking at everyone’s faces as they started playing, you could see grins light up around the room. By the end everyone was up dancing and clapping. It was the perfect way to celebrate, and it felt like a full circle moment, as they’ve been working with researchers at ARC West.
CM: It’s one thing to read about these different organisations and what they do, but to experience it means people have a better understanding. It was also an opportunity to let people know about Dovetail Orchestra in case they want to join.
People were meeting for the first time at this event, so we included an ice breaker and asked people to find something in common with the person they were sitting next to. We had a tree on flipchart paper (LC: beautifully drawn by the talented Mike Bell with birds and all!) that we stuck the post-its on and read out. It was a great intro and showed how much people had in common.
We also had a separate room where people could pray during the event, and a table of arts and crafts bits so if people wanted to do some crafting, that was also an option.
This was our fourth thank you event and we always look at what worked, what didn’t work, what would we do differently next time and what should we be thinking about for future events. It’s important to collect feedback from the people who attended. We will always speak to the public contributors and community members that we work with to check we’re coming up with something people actually want to attend.
LC: Because you should say thank you to people. It’s that simple.
CM: Well put Lucy!
LC: People are giving up their time. They deserve to be recognised and feel valued. Obviously, it’s very important to pay public contributors, but it’s nice to do something a bit more meaningful and make them feel part of something bigger.
CM: Yeah, I completely agree. I think sometimes that thank you element can get forgotten because you think, “OK, we’re paying people for the time, that’s enough”. But the event is showing people are going above and beyond to support research to make a difference. They might have had a negative experience, and they are re-living their experience to make things better for others. So, I think this is a way of us showing our appreciation and beyond payment.
LC: Overall, the feedback was very positive. From observation, it looked like everyone was enjoying the event and having fun.
CM: One piece of feedback that stood out was someone saying how much they valued the opportunity to reconnect with people they’d not seen for a while. And it was clear how much people loved the Dovetail Orchestra performance.
LC: We’ve tried to make the socialising aspect central to these events. There’s a research influence, but that’s not the drive. The focus is to bring people together and to create an informal space where they feel comfortable. Hopefully that’s what we achieved!
I think people were relaxed and happy talking.
CM: I agree. When people ask, “what does relationship building look like?”, it’s events and creating spaces like this, isn’t it?
LC: Yeah, 100%. When you see it in action, you can immediately see why it’s so important. It’s really the backbone to everything we do in public involvement.
LC: We will definitely hold them again in a community venue. Our next one will be in the summer. We will be requesting another Dovetail performance!
And of course, we will make sure we design this event around what the public contributors tell us they want.
But we must acknowledge that this wouldn’t be possible without the support of our senior management team. We needed funds to pay for the venue, food and to reimburse the public contributors who were co-presenting for their preparation time and travel.
This was only possible because our managers and organisations acknowledge the value and the importance of these events and provide the support and resources. Without this it would not be possible, so a huge thank you from us!