Dissemination by TRUSS is keenly aware of the importance of not only producing and presenting research outputs for the scientific community and key stakeholders (i.e., via conferences, workshops, publications and reports), but also engaging the general public in line with the Innovation Union objectives. While the TRUSS programme remains highly technical, there is little doubt that the wider public will find aspects of interest in this research. The fact that the research topics impact directly on the day-to-day lives of people gives the research a relevance that allows TRUSS to capture the interest and inspire younger students with an interest in engineering.
TRUSS mainly deals with the challenges faced at the design, assessment and management stages of large scale structures. Outreach activities, blogs and social media and other communications by TRUSS, bring awareness to the public on the importance of this research on infrastructure to support a community, region or country, and also motivate School and University students to pursue a research career. Each ESR is involved in at least one public engagement activity per year. These activities make citizens aware of:
- infrastructure aging and failing, with funding that has been insufficient to repair and replace it;
- the important role of the Marie Skłodowksa-Curie Actions in forming 21st century engineers that will have the skills to face the formidable challenge of modernizing the fundamental infrastructure that support civilization.