FREE WEBINAR | Community Engagement and Net Zero, hosted by The Open University.
Tuesday 8th July 2025, 12:00 – 13:00 BST.
Synopsis:
Shaping sustainable futures requires collective action, innovative solutions, and a shared commitment to sustainability. This webinar focuses on the need for active engagement from all stakeholders, including private, public, and third sector organisations, as well as local communities in achieving net zero transition. By co-planning, co-designing, and co-delivering initiatives, we can achieve a successful transition to net zero. Involving community members in planning, decision-making, and implementation ensures greater success and long-lasting benefits for both people and the planet. Community engagement harnesses local knowledge, fosters collaboration, and drives impactful change. However, it also presents challenges.
Our webinar brings together visionary experts who will discuss the role of community engagement in net zero transitions through innovative approaches for creating a sustainable future. Whether you are an experienced environmental advocate or just starting out, this webinar can offer valuable insights and actionable ideas to help you make a positive impact through community engagement in the net zero transition.
Session Panellists:
Dr. Francesca Calo (PhD) is a Senior Lecturer in Management at the Department of Public Leadership & Social Enterprise, where she brings academic experience from posts held in the UK and Italy. She is also the OU investigator for the Horizon Europe funded project ENCASE where she is exploring co-creation projects in relation to green transition.
Dr. Alina Kadyrova is a Postdoctoral Research Associate at The Open University Business School, working on the Horizon Europe ENCASE project (A European Network of Research Infrastructures for CO2 Transport and Injection), which aims to improve the social integration of selected European CCUS research infrastructures. Her research lies on the intersection of social innovation, territorial development, and sustainability transitions, researching the relationships between contextual dynamics and the pathways towards the impact of social innovation. Alina holds a PhD in Science, Technology and Innovation Policy from Manchester Institute of Innovation Research (MIOIR), Alliance Manchester Business School, the University of Manchester.
Samanthi Theminimulle is a Senior Researcher at the Young Foundation. She works across a range of research projects for the Institute for Community Studies and The Young Foundation. She is motivated by making research more accessible and equitable, and loves research the most when it is used to bring communities together to co-create the change they want to see happen and enable more distributed decision-making.
Before joining the Institute for Community Studies in February 2022, Samanthi worked at the RSA as a researcher, focused on more participatory approaches to research on housing, placemaking and community wellbeing, and as a peer researcher for Toynbee Hall on their work to improve the housing sector for young people in London.
Samanthi is a facilitator with Civic Square and Enrol Yourself on their peer-led work to reimagine more equitable and regenerative neighbourhoods. She is also a trustee for RUSS Lewisham, a community land trust, building affordable housing in the place she grew up. Aside from that, you can find her covered in clay on her mission to become a self-taught ceramicist.
Dr Alison Fox is a Senior Lecturer in Education at the Open University in the Faculty of Wellbeing, Education and Language and Sport and Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. Originally trained as an environmental scientist and working in environmental consultancy, Alison turned to a career in education, focusing in the secondary and tertiary sector on embedding education for sustainability within and across the curriculum. As Alison moved into higher education research and teaching, she has retained a commitment to championing education for sustainable development in the postgraduate curriculum, through open courses and within her work in the Human Research Ethics Committee in providing guidance and encouragement for researchers to include environmental sustainability into their research plans and conduct. This contributes to The Open University’s commitment as a recent signatory to the Concordat for Environmental Sustainability in Research and Innovation. Alison is currently leading an international, interdisciplinary and intergenerational project across Scotland, Kenya and Nigeria which is facilitating children and young people in taking a lead through art for action – artivism – in calling policymakers and business leaders to account and demanding to be part of the decision-making for future climate action.
Dr. Aqueel Wahga is Senior Lecturer in Management and Director at the Center for Social and Sustainable Enterprise (CSSE) at The Open University. As an entrepreneurship and SME development focused researcher, Dr Wahga investigates the growth dynamics and environmentally responsible behaviour of firms. He also researches the enterprise development initiatives focused on institutionalising entrepreneurship. In these areas, he engages with a range of themes including sustainability, enterprise development, enterprise policy, innovation and dynamic capabilities of firms. Moreover, with a postgraduate degree in Economics, he also likes to investigate socio-economic and political issues. Dr. Wahga supervises PhD and Master level students in all these areas, while also providing capacity building trainings to diverse stakeholders.
See the full Net Zero Week 2025 webinar series here.
