BU Research Blog

Good question and, although no firm decisions have yet been announced by HEFCE, it is looking increasingly likely that all academic staff at BU will be included in the REF 2021 submission, each with at least one output published between 2014-2020.

In the midst of the sector waiting with baited breath for the initial decisions from the UK funding bodies on this, and other REF questions, HEFCE held a webinar in July. During this webinar they shared some possible decisions with the sector (the webinar and the slides are available here on the HEFCE website). The key suggestions were:

• 100% of academics with a “significant responsibility” to undertake research are likely to be included. It is unclear at this stage what “significant responsibility” means in practice, although it is anticipated this will be based on there being an expectation for an academic member of staff to undertake research.
• Staff without a significant responsibility for research may be exempt from inclusion but auditable documentation would be required. This would need to explicitly evidence there is not an expectation of the individual to undertake research (examples given were workload models or career frameworks linked to the individual).
• Everyone submitted is likely to need a minimum of 1 output. The average and maximum outputs per FTE are to be determined – in the consultation it was proposed these were an average of 2 outputs per submitted FTE and a maximum of six outputs per person.
• There is likely to be a hybrid model for output portability (i.e. which HEI can submit the outputs authored by a member of academic staff who moves from one institution to another during the REF period) – HEFCE proposed two options:
  • Simple model whereby both old and new institutions can submit the outputs produced by the academic member of staff when he/she was employed at the old institution (this would, some might say unfortunately, result in double counting of outputs but this can probably be tolerated as it happens already in some cases, for example, where co-authors at different HEIs submit the same output).
  • Complex model whereby a census date and employment range date are used to determine which outputs can be submitted by which institution.

Whilst these are not yet firm decisions (these are expected in two communications – one on staff and outputs in the autumn and one on everything else later this month), these are the clearest indications yet that all academic staff at BU will be included in REF 2021, each with at least one output.

For further information on REF 2021, see BU’s REF 2021 webpage. If you have any queries, please contact Julie Northam or Shelly Anne Stringer.