The College of Liberal Arts & Sciences hosts the University's annual Difference Festival. It is our way to engage with members of our community, our research partners and those outside the University by inviting them to join us on campus or online to debate and discuss questions that matter to us all. Our next festival will take place from 27 February to 3 March 2023; we are planning to offer events on site as well as events online. 

For our 2023 Festival we invite events that engage with the following questions:

• How can and should we, as a University, respond to global challenges?
• What is our role in anticipating challenges?
• What can our extended community, including business, organisations, schools, the public, learn from universities in relation to the impact these challenges may have on them?
• What do they expect universities to contribute in response to global challenges if anything at all?

We understand global challenges in a very wide sense, ranging from crises like the rapid spread of diseases or the extinction of languages to the global climate crisis with all its implications for economies and societies.

We are inviting contributions from as many people as possible for this event. The starting point should be research or knowledge exchange work you are already undertaking. We encourage events that invite discussion, have external participants, and work across different discipline areas. Contributions can be from individuals or groups and can span Schools and disciplines. As we wish to engage proactively with our community, we specifically welcome proposals for events in collaboration with community groups or other partners from outside academia. We are happy to help facilitate partnerships through our existing networks where no partner is listed in the submission.

Proposed events could be workshops, performances, facilitated discussions, viewings, exhibitions, interactive experiences, or something completely different we’ve not seen before. We want to provide the opportunity to bring to achieve the widest audience engagement possible, in the widest array of styles possible.