BU Research Blog

July 17, 2017

NIHR seeks peer reviewers

Funding opportunities, Research assessment Lisa Andrews

The National Institute for Health Research is recruiting medical scientists, practitioners and lay people to join its pool of peer reviewers.

Interested parties can apply as an individual with professional experience or as a patient, carer or member of the public.

In particular, the institute is looking for candidates from within the health service with expertise as academics, clinicians, health service managers, practitioners and public health professionals. It is also looking for individuals working in social care, patients, the general public and others whose work could impact on health.

To find out more and apply, see here.

July 11, 2017

REF Main Panel Chairs announced

Research assessment Julie Northam

The main panels will provide leadership and guidance to the sub-panels that undertake the REF assessment. As chairs designate, the appointees will at first advise the funding bodies on the initial decisions and on the further development of the framework. They will take up their roles as chairs later in the year*, once the outcomes of the ‘consultation on the second REF’ are announced and further appointments to the REF panels have been made.

The Main Panel Chairs (designate) for each of the four main panel areas are:

Main Panel A: Medicine, health and life sciences – Professor John Iredale, Pro Vice-Chancellor Health, University of Bristol
Main Panel B: Physical sciences, engineering and mathematics – Professor David Price, Vice-Provost (Research), University College London
Main Panel C: Social sciences – Professor Jane Millar OBE, Professor of Social Policy and former Pro Vice-Chancellor for Research, University of Bath.
Main Panel D: Arts and humanities – Professor Dinah Birch CBE, Pro Vice-Chancellor for Research and Impact, University of Liverpool.

Biographies for the Main Panel Chairs are available here: Biographies

*Interesting to note that HEFCE have reaffirmed their previous commitment to announce the outcomes of the consultation later this year, despite rumours this would either be delayed or result in a second technical consultation.

June 27, 2017

Multiple Sclerosis Research in Bournemouth – Dr Simon B N Thompson

BRIAN, BU Challenges, conferences, Fusion, Grants Academy, innovation, international, Public engagement, Research assessment, Research Integritiy, Research themes, staff profile pages Simon Thompson

MS is a chronic debilitating and progressive condition that affects the fatty tissue sheath surrounding nerves. Incomplete innervation due to loss of the myelin sheath is largely responsible for uncoordinated movements. Brain temperature fluctuations are also often seen in people with MS together with fatigue when carrying out mentally or physically demanding tasks. These are commonly associated with excessive yawning yet the cause of fatigue in MS is not well understood.

A recently completed study asked participants to produce saliva into a small tube so that their cortisol levels could be analysed. They were also asked to look at presentations that provoked a yawning response. Results revealed that all of the participants had elevated cortisol levels after yawning and that there was a marked difference in cortisol levels between the healthy participants and those with MS.

Yawning: Pynq Thompson aged 28 days

Thompson Cortisol Hypothesis (Ref.1) proposes threshold levels of cortisol trigger the yawn response which lowers brain temperature. Correlation between brain temperature and cortisol is to be further examined together with comparison between UK and Norwegian participants with MS since the incidence of MS is greater in Scandinavian countries (and Canada and Scotland) possibly due to vitamin D and K reduction with reduced sunlight.

Previous studies have examined electromyograph (EMG) activity during yawning and manipulation of conditions to provoke yawning (Refs. 2,3). Brain regions and cortisol activity has been identified in MS in an international study (Ref. 4); and a new understanding proposed of communication between the motor cortex and brain-stem (Ref.5).

Yawning EMG “envelope” of activity

We have recently completed a trial in Bournemouth that recruited over 80 healthy participants and over 30 people with Multiple Sclerosis (MS).

A funding bid is being prepared to examine the feasibility of producing the early detection of MS and cortisol-insufficiency syndromes using observed yawning frequency and cortisol levels.

Simon B N Thompson is Associate Professor, Bournemouth University; Visiting Professor, Université Paris Ouest Nanterre La Défense, France. Member of International Scientific Council for Research into Multiple Sclerosis following presentation to French Ambassador, His Excellency Bernard Emié, French Embassy.

Acknowledgements

Thanks to all volunteers; Alister Coleman and Nicola Williams for assisting in data collection and analysis; Rod Slip, Group Co-ordinator and Kay Bundy, Fundraising Co-ordinator of the MS Society Osborne Centre for providing free facilities.

Note

The author would welcome interest in collaborating in writing bids for funding international work.

References

1. Thompson, S.B.N., 2011. Born to yawn? Cortisol linked to yawning: a new hypothesis. Medical Hypotheses, 77, 861-862.
2. Thompson, S.B.N., & Bishop, P., 2012. Born to yawn? Understanding yawning as a warning of the rise in cortisol levels: randomized trial. Interactive Journal of Medical Research, 1(2), e4, 1-9, doi: 10.2196/ijmr.2241.
3. Thompson, S.B.N., Frankham, C., & Bishop, P., 2014. The art of capturing a yawn using the science of nerve impulses and cortisol levels in a randomized controlled trial. Thompson Cortisol Hypothesis as a potential predictor of neurological impairment. International Journal of Arts & Sciences, 7(3), 529-543.
4. Thompson, S. B. N., Daly, S., Le Blanche, A., Adibi, M., Belkhiria, C., Driss, T., de Marco, G., 2016. fMRI randomized study of mental and motor task performance and cortisol levels to potentiate cortisol as a new diagnostic biomarker. Journal of Neurology & Neuroscience, 7(2); 92: 1-8.
5. Thompson, S.B.N., 2017. Hypothesis to explain yawning, cortisol rise, brain cooling and motor cortex involvement of involuntary arm movement in neurologically impaired patients. Journal of Neurology & Neuroscience, 8(1); 167: 1-5.

June 5, 2017

REF 2021 – stocktake exercises

Research assessment Julie Northam

With the publication of the Stern Review last summer and the funding bodies’ Second Consultation on the REF earlier this year, there’s been a lot of discussion at BU and across the sector around REF 2021 lately. Despite this, and indeed because of this, we’re still none the wiser as to what the next REF will look like. Like many other universities, we are progressing with our internal preparations whilst we await the publication of the initial decisions from the funding bodies’ in response to the feedback to their consultation (predicted to be later this year).

One of the ways BU is preparing is by running a stocktake exercise to see what outputs academic staff have published since 1 January 2014 and what potential impact BU research is having. Not only will this provide a summary of progress c. half way through the REF assessment period, it will also enable resources to be allocated to support further high-quality outputs and to accelerate research impact.

The stocktake exercise is being run in two cohorts:

Cohort 1 takes place this summer and involves UOAs – 2, 3, 4, 12, 22/23, 25, 34 and 36.
Cohort 2 takes place this autumn and involves UOAs – 11, 17 (archaeology), 17 (geography and environmental studies), 19, 20, 26 and 29.

The process will be the same for each cohort. On the outputs side, we are changing from individuals self-nominating for their inclusion in the exercise to a model where all academic staff (with a research-only or a teaching and research contract) are automatically included. This ensures the exercise is fully inclusive whilst reducing the burden on individual academic staff. In terms of impact, we are changing from colleagues writing impact case studies to inviting them to attend a meeting and deliver a short informal presentation of their research, its impact and their plans for generating further impact, followed by a discussion with the panel. This is linked to the launch of the new impact tracker in BRIAN.

The stocktake exercises are designed to be fully inclusive, positive and developmental. Further information about the REF is available on the Research Blog’s REF webpage.

May 19, 2017

SciVal’s Field weighted citation impact: Sample size matters!

Guidance, Publishing, Research assessment, Research Ethics, Research Integritiy, writing sastringer

There’s been a buzz on social media recently about Field weighted Citation Impact (FWCI) particularly around the recent leak from the University of Manchester that the FWCI is one of the measures suggested by which to assess academics most at risk of redundancy:

So, these are the proposed criteria I (a historian, remember) wd have to meet to avoid being among the ⁓140 of whom ⁓65 will lose our jobs. pic.twitter.com/voLNnzLsnW

— James Sumner (@JamesBSumner) May 13, 2017

In his recent blog on The Bibliomagician Blog (reposted here with permission) Iain Rowlands a Research Information & Intelligence Specialist at King’s College London and a member of the LIS-Bibliometrics committee questions the stability of the FWCI indicator for sets of fewer than 10,000 documents. Ian invites others to use his methodology to further test his theory…

SciVal’s field-weighted citation impact (FWCI) is an article-level metric that takes the form of a simple ratio: actual citations to a given output divided by the expected rate for outputs of similar age, subject and publication type. FWCI has the dual merits of simplicity and ease of interpretation: a value of 2 indicates that an output has achieved twice the expected impact relative to the world literature. It is a really useful addition to the benchmarking toolkit.

The trouble is that, typically, the distribution of citations to outputs is highly skewed, with most outputs achieving minimal impact at one end and a small number of extreme statistical outliers at the other. Applying the arithmetic mean to data distributed like this, as does FWCI, is not ideal because the outliers can exert a strong leveraging effect, “inflating” the average for the whole set. This effect is likely to be more marked the smaller the sample size.

I explored this effect in a simple experiment. I downloaded SciVal FWCI values for 52,118 King’s College London papers published up until 2014. I then calculated mean FWCI and 95% confidence (or stability) intervals for the whole sample using the bootstrapping[1] feature in SPSS. Then I took progressively smaller random samples (99%, 98%, and so on to 1%, then 0.1%), recalculating mean FWCI and stability intervals each time.

The findings shows how mean FWCI becomes less stable as sample size decreases. Highly cited outliers are relatively uncommon, but their chance inclusion or exclusion makes a big difference, especially as the number of outputs decreases. In this experiment, FWCI values range across four orders of magnitude, from 0.03 to 398.28.

What does this mean for interpreting FWCI, especially when benchmarking? The table below offers some guidance. It shows typical stability intervals around FWCI at different scales. The final column assumes that SciVal spits out a value of 2.20 and shows how that figure should be interpreted in terms of its stability.

It’s pretty clear from this analysis that you need to know when it’s time to stop when you are drilling down in SciVal! Another implication is that there is no sensible justification for quoting FWCI to two let alone three decimal places of precision. I’ve kept the second decimal place above simply for purposes of demonstration.

I am well aware that the guidance above is based on data from just one institution, and may not travel well. If you would like to replicate this experiment using your own data, I’m happy to share my SPSS Syntax file. It automates the whole thing, so you just have to load and go off on a short holiday! Just drop me an email.

Ian Rowlands is a Research Information & Intelligence Specialist at King’s College London and a member of the LIS-Bibliometrics committee.

ian.rowlands@kcl.ac.uk

May 15, 2017

HE policy update w/e 12th May 2017

Knowledge Exchange, Research assessment, Student Engagement jforster

Higher Education and Research Act 2017 – the final text has now been published online and in a pdf version. The next step will be implementation of the many changes in the Act, which cannot move on substantially until after the election – and of course in the unlikely event of a Labour victory, implementation might look rather different, as well as their much publicised promises on fees and loans (see below) – although.

The TEF is in place (being run by HEFCE until the OfS takes over). It will be reviewed later this summer after the year 2 results are announced on 14^th June. We are also looking forward to announcements on subject level TEF. There have been hints that there will be a structure for this that works alongside REF UoAs.
Research structures – It was announced that David Sweeney (currently Director of Research, Education and Knowledge Exchange at HEFCE) will be the Executive Chair of Research England in April 2018 when UKRI is established.
As a reminder, the new research structure (from the White Paper) is set out below. Research England will: “oversee the England-only functions in relation to research and knowledge exchange, including:
- providing grant funding to English universities for research and knowledge exchange activities,
- developing and implementing the Research Excellence Framework in partnership with the UK Higher Education (HE) funding bodies,
- oversight of sustainability of the HE research base in England and
- overseeing the £900 million UK Research Partnership Investment Fund”.

This appointment follows two more:
- Sir Mark Walport, UKRI Chief Executive Designate
- Sir John Kingman as Chair of UKRI

Implementation of the OfS – one appointment was made earlier this year, Sir Michael Barber – Chair of the Office for Students (Education committee scrutiny here). The Chief Executive of the OfS has not been announced yet. There is a vacancy open until 14^th June 2017 for the Director of Fair Access and Participation, OfS. There will be a consultation on the OfS regulatory framework later in 2017 and the new bodies will be established in Spring 2018 (source: HEFCE, Feb 2017).
Regulatory structure and alternative providers – HEFCE have already published the first iteration of the new register of providers – part of the White Paper changes. It includes alternative providers.

General Election – GE2017

Have you registered to vote – and do you know where you will be on 8^th June? There is a renewed push for voter registration –especially as many students may not be at their usual address for this election. It is easy to register (with your National Insurance number), check or register for a postal vote if you will not be at home or wherever you usually vote.

Labour’s leaked manifesto includes a pledge to abolish tuition fees, as well as reintroduce maintenance grants (as noted last week). This has been covered widely as part of a wider story about affordability of the manifesto commitments. Apart from cost, concerns have been raised that this policy, although it might increase participation amongst lower income families, would in the end mainly help high and middle-income families and those students who go on to earn higher wages (and repay their loans).

Wonkhe have an article on the costs of this by Dr Gavan Conlon of London Economics
HEPI blog here that highlights the risks of the Labour policy
Here is a BBC story and a link to their Reality Check
Guardian coverage here
With this week’s focus on fees, a blog on Wonkhe by the President of the SU of the University of Central Lancashire emphasises the non-financial benefits of a university education

ITV News have the whole draft manifesto as leaked – there is a lot about schools and further and adult education but the fees and grants pledge is the only reference to HE.

There is a paragraph about Industrial strategy too – but it doesn’t say much that is specific apart from a change to business rates for plant and machinery, superfast broadband, Wi-Fi and mobile coverage and appointing a Digital Ambassador.
In the Brexit section it talks about rights for EU nationals in the UK, seeking to stay in Horizon 2020, Euratom, Erasmus etc.

For more general coverage on the election, the BBC have a “pledge tracker”.

HEPI published a speech by Nick Hillman at an event this week which mentions outward mobility (see next item) and makes a number of calls for change:

better information for students on where their fees go;
renewed support for university-based teacher training to tackle the recruitment crisis in our schools;
a tougher regime for recouping student loans from those abroad;
better support for students’ mental health, which is less good than among the population as a whole and young people in general; and
a focus on the underachievement of young men, who are less likely to enter higher education, more likely to drop out and less likely to get a First or 2:i.

Sarah was at the event and noted that Jo Johnson repeated that there is no cap on international student numbers, referred to an ongoing focus on social mobility if the Conservatives win the election. The speech has not been published yet. Meanwhile it seems that the conservative Manifesto will include a repeat of the target for immigration in the 10s of 1000s (see the FT for some of the coverage). There is an interesting article from the Institute for Government on how this might have to work in practice – it does seem likely that there will need to be a work permit or visa arrangement for all, including (new) EU citizens if this is to be achieved. And there will be lots of lobbying from all the sectors who want their needs to be prioritised. Bloomberg have a story about a “brickie visa” reporting comments from Migration Watch UK.

The Herald Scotland report Tim Farron pledging the return of post study work visas if the Lib Dems are elected.

Student Mobility – UUK published their UK Strategy for Outward Student Mobility for 2017-2020. This calls for more students to have an international experience and sets out a number of strategic objectives:

Promote the benefits of study and work abroad
Monitor trends in student mobility
Build capacity in UK higher education to facilitate outward mobility
Share best practice in UK higher education
Provide a collective voice for UK higher education
Influence government for UK higher education

Most of these are about communication, information and lobbying. The third, on building capacity, is the most hard-edged, and the strategy proposes that UUK will work with the sector and others to do a range of things, including:

Secure major investment to support outward mobility, including mobility grants.
Secure new mobility opportunities for the UK sector, either directly or through strategic partnerships.
Work with the Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) and university representative bodies including the Association for UK Higher Education European Officers (HEURO) and British Universities Transatlantic Exchange Association (BUTEX) to provide guidance on interpreting and applying quality assurance frameworks related to student placements overseas.

Brexit – Peter Mason, policy manager for UUKi, has written a blog for Wonkhe on the Swiss experiences with EU research and mobility programmes following their own referendum. The Swiss example – they were suspended from H2020 and Erasmus following their own vote on freedom of movement – was widely cited in the referendum campaigns as a warning that leaving the EU would mean the UK would not be able to stay in those programmes. The Swiss are still not in Erasmus, and they are back into H2020 following a compromise on freedom of movement. The most interesting lesson is that the Swiss tried to replace H202 with their own scheme “it lacked prestige and was not seen as a sustainable long-term substitute. Moreover, the damaging impact of the uncertainty created through the process was clear, with a significant drop-off in the number of Swiss participations in Horizon 2020 compared to the previous framework programme, particularly in collaborative projects.”

April 27, 2017

BRIAN OFFLINE – 2nd & 3rd May 2017

BRIAN, Publishing, Research assessment, staff profile pages sastringer

BRIAN is being upgraded and will be unavailable for use on Tuesday 2nd and Wednesday 3rd May.

The main improvements from this upgrade include:

New Impact Tracking Module
New Homepage
More User Friendly Navigation

The new and improved features will make BRIAN easier and simplier to use for everyone, whilst also providing a valuable tool to academics helping them record the impact of their research

All relevant guidance notes and video guides on the Staff Intranet will be updated in due course. If you need any help using the new system or if you encounter any problems after the upgrade, please do send an email to BRIAN@bournemouth.ac.uk and a member of staff will be able to assist you.

BRIAN training sessions are also available:

Thursday 15^th June 2017

With further dates planned. If you are interested to book on to any of these training sessions, please click here to book on!

In the meantime, if you do have queries relating to the upgrade, please get in touch with BRIAN@bournemouth.ac.uk

April 3, 2017

FHSS – New Impact Champion

Research assessment ckillingback

I just wanted to take this opportunity to introduce myself as the new Impact Champion for the Faculty of Health and Social Sciences. When I began my research journey several years ago I knew I wanted my research to make a difference. It is this on-going desire to make a difference which led me to pursue this role of Impact Champion.

Part of my role is to take the lead in supporting academics to develop, maintain and ensure that research impact aligns with our core principle of ‘helping to make people’s lives better’. I will also be involved in developing impact case studies, and proactively accelerating impact in relation to REF.

Please don’t hesitate to get in touch if there is anything I can do to support you in your research impact.

Clare Killingback: ckillingback@bournemouth.ac.uk

March 21, 2017

Writing Days

Publishing, Research assessment, writing sastringer

Imagine… dedicated time and space to write away from every day distractions.

Sounds great? Then you’ll be glad to hear that as part of the Writing Academy we are busy scheduling a number of Writing Days for BU authors to book on to.

Watch. This. Space.

March 20, 2017

HE policy update w/e17th March 2017

Research assessment jforster

Brexit:

Research Professional illustrates the Brexit threats to research positioning and job losses by highlighting the difficulties facing an EU astronomy consortium. The consortium represents seven countries, led by the UK, but will move headquarters to an EU member state from January 2021. The move means the UK will lose the project’s leadership and the 12 UK universities may not continue post-Brexit. Research Professional notes that while access to research infrastructures is available to non-EU states, the EU membership plays a significant role in decisions on where to locate facilities. Gerry Gilmore (the consortium leader, from University of Cambridge) stated:
“The UK will lose substantial scientific leadership and influence in the EU. There is going to be bad news all around. I don’t think people realise how many new jobs and new opportunities have just been destroyed.”
The EU (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill has survived the parliamentary process and received Royal Assent on 16^th March (BBC). This bill allows the Prime Minister to notify the EU of the UK’s intention to withdraw from the EU. The Lords made two amendments to the Bill – one relating to Parliament having a “meaningful vote” on the final arrangements and one requiring a guarantee for EU citizens to remain in the UK. The bill was approved by the House of Commons, which rejected the Lords bill and then went back to the Lords under what is called “ping-pong”. The Lords voted again on both issues but the House of Lords majority backed down and the bill was passed. The PM is expected to trigger article 50 later in March.
2018/19 EU student and staff guarantees: During oral questions in the Lords Baroness Royall of Blaisdon pressed the government spokesperson (Viscount Younger of Leckie) when announcements would be made regarding fees and access to loans for 2018/19 EU student starters. Leckie gave a side stepping response: “The noble Baroness makes the important point that there are uncertainties arising from Brexit, but the Government have moved rapidly to give assurances to this sector… “We have also provided similar assurances that EU nationals starting courses in 2016-17 and 2017-18 remain eligible for Research Council postgraduate support. As I have said, we will ensure that students starting in 2018-19 have the information well in advance”

International students:

The debate over the inclusion of international students in the long-term migrant numbers continues. Even senior ministers are rebelling – Boris Johnson, Phillip Hammond and Liam Fox have all protested, although Jo Johnson continues to toe the party line backing the PM’s stance to include international students within the original immigration statistics. Liam Fox spoke out this week about the value of overseas campuses.
On Monday the House of Lords defeated the government on the Higher Education and Research Bill (HERB), approving an amendment to prevent international students being counted as long-term migrants. The government have responded that “the proposed amendment would create a situation where we were potentially unable to apply basic visa checks, or impose conditions on a student visa. It would also mean that fresh primary legislation were needed just to make minor, technical changes to immigration rules.” (Wonkhe)
HERB is scheduled to have its third reading in the Lords on 22 March 2017 and then will go back to the Commons. The PM’s stance on international students seems rock solid (Financial Times) and Theresa May is not expected to waiver – the parliamentary ping pong regarding international students will surely make headlines over the coming weeks.
Meanwhile there are worries about student recruitment. Politics Home quotes an Office for National Statistics release stating the number of students coming to the UK dropped by 41,000 in 2016.

Higher Education and Research Bill:

The HE and Research Bill has finished its third reading in the House of Lords (although it will have to go back if the House of Commons makes any changes, as seems likely). The report stage in the Lords is on 22nd March – usually only technical or minor amendments are made at this stage. The current version of the bill as amended by the Lords is here.
The surprise amendment on international students is referred to above.
The government won the final vote on the proposed amendment that would have required UKRI and OfS to jointly revoke research degree awarding powers, the amendment was defeated. Wonkhe report that Lord Mackay made an impassioned speech noting that it was “extraordinary” that the OfS was not required to have any expertise or experience regarding research, and yet had the unilateral power to revoke research degree awarding powers, but to no avail. The Bill continues to say that research degree-awarding powers should be made by the OfS with advice from UKRI.

With long debates, late nights and a large number of amendments, it is fair to say that HERB has received an excellent level of scrutiny within the Lords. Lord Prior of Brampton notes: “Everyone who has contributed [to the Bill debates] can take some credit for having improved it considerably. For me, it is a good example of the value this House can bring to a Bill of this kind.”

HEFCE 2017/18 funding to universities: The grant letter details the overall funding to the sector for 2017/18. It includes doubled funding for the National Collaborative Outreach Programme (£60m pa), an additional £17m increase for mainstream quality-related research, a reduction of £40m for teaching (including a reduction in PGT FTE funding rate), maintaining the disabled students premium at the 2016/17 level, the inclusion of nursing, midwifery and allied health professions (£32m), cuts to the student premium budget for full time UG of £20m (part time UG funding remains static). Institutions will receive individual allocations in April although with a publication embargo in force until May. Capital allocations will be announced in March.

Student Loans Sale: A parliamentary question tabled by Steve McCabe requested publication of the ‘in-depth market testing exercise associated with the same of the student loan book. Jo Johnson has responded: “The Government ran a market testing process with a cross-section of potential investors in the student loan book from the end of September into November 2016. This sought feedback on potential sale structures and key features of the transaction and informed the design of the sale. This was a commercial rather than a public process and was conducted under non-disclosure agreements. We do not intend to publish a report of the details. Protecting the details of the conclusions of market testing will help the ongoing sale process achieve value for money for taxpayers.”

Student Fees: On Thursday 16^th the Petitions Committee released its latest decisions regarding recent petitions with a high number of signatures. This included a petition to government to change the University fees from £9250 back to the £3000 fee. The Committee agreed to wait for the Higher Education and Research Bill to complete its passage through Parliament before deciding whether to schedule a debate – effectively this was a dismissal of the petition.

Research Excellence Framework The responses to the REF2021 consultation were due in by midday on 17^th March.

There has been a lot of focus on one area, the definition of “research active staff” for the returns – there are some interesting views:
HEFCE blog (and BU’s reply) – HEFCE are proposing a negotiated definition for each university, BU is proposing all staff should be returned, including teaching only
Royal Society blog on Research Professional – they say staff shouldn’t be returned at all, it should be institutional
The PVC (Research and Enterprise) from Hertfordshire says on Times Higher Education that the solution is flawed and that clarity is needed

There are many other issues in the REF consultation, including the portability of outputs, which will have important consequences for institutions and their staff. The HEFCE REF consultation on the implementation of the REF 2021 closed on 17 March 2017. You can read BU’s response here.

March 10, 2017

Blog by the Vice-Chancellor – what next for the Teaching Excellence Framework

Fusion, Research assessment jforster

The BBC 2 series “Meet the Lords” could not have been better timed. The House of Lords has flexed its muscles on the Article 50 Bill and this week’s episode coincided with them passing an amendment to the Higher Education and Research Bill (HE Bill) that breaks the link between the Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF) and fees. Since then another amendment has been passed that would change the nature of the TEF, and bring it under Parliamentary scrutiny.

It would be easy to dismiss these (as some have done) as acts of rebellion by a non-elected chamber that is in the case of the HE Bill, representing vested interests in the face of a genuine government attempt to reform a sector that is badly in need of it. The Department for Education could be forgiven if they had thought that the HE Bill was nearly home and dry. They had published a long list of amendments which had been largely welcomed by the sector. The TEF does not require Parliamentary approval. Universities UK and GuildHE, amongst others, had expressed support for the HE bill as amended and expressed support for the TEF – opposing the addition of more detail as it would reduce flexibility in future negotiations on the detail. But the House of Lords did not agree – they have not sought to add more detail in the TEF, but to change its nature completely. Reading the debates, it is clear that members of the House of Lords, like most of the sector, generally support the objectives of TEF in bringing focus on the quality of education and student outcomes. They support the provision of more and better information about universities for applicants and others. They, like many in the sector, also generally support an inflationary increase in fees.

In the latest amendment, the provisions for the TEF in clause 26 have been removed and the new clause instead requires the Secretary of State to bring forward a scheme to identify whether an institution meets or fails to meet expectations based on quality standards but it “must not be used to create a single composite ranking of English higher education providers”. The arguments are neatly summarised by Lord Lucas: “Bronze will be seen as failing because these universities will be marked out as the bottom 20%. This is just not necessary. We have succeeded, in our research rankings, in producing a measure of sufficient detail and sophistication for people to read it in detail. It produces quite marked differences between institutions, but nobody reads it as a mark of a failing institution. It is information, not ranking…”.

An earlier amendment removed the differentiation between fees based on different ratings. The speeches in the House of Lords demonstrate that they are opposed to this link for different reasons, for example:

Baroness Deech “If we detach fees from gold, silver and bronze, we stand a chance of increasing social mobility under the amendment. If we do not, social mobility will be frozen and ghettoisation will increase.”
Baroness Wolf of Dulwich: “I want to cite three groups of academics ….all of which feel, as do students, that in their current state the TEF metrics are not up to the job of determining fee levels and that, until we are sure that we have valid and reliable measures, we should not do this.”
Lord Lipsey : “… what seems knocking on bizarre is to plough on with bringing in this link between fees and the TEF before we have got the TEF right….The Government would give themselves the best chance of proving themselves right and the sceptics wrong if they gave time for the TEF to settle down before they brought in the fees link.”
Lord Kerslake: “My second reason for not making the link is that the TEF rating will relate to the university, not the subject or course. We will not see subject-level ratings until 2020 and yet we know that it is perfectly possible to have a mediocre course in an otherwise excellent university, and indeed vice versa. It can be argued that the TEF ranking gives an indication of the overall student experience at a particular institution, but the variation which so obviously exists within institutions makes that argument quite unconvincing.”

Except for the subject level fee point (which has not become a topic of debate yet), these are all arguments that were made by the sector in responding to the Green Paper and the TEF consultation. These are all things that we have continued to raise as we discuss the implications of subject-level TEF.

So as it stands, the TEF has lost both of its “incentives” – aka its carrot and its stick, which were both in the form of the impact on fees and reputation. It is not at all clear what will happen next – some ideas are given in this Wonkhe blog. In blogs on the Times Higher Education, Maddaleine Ansell of the University Alliance and Sorana Vieru gave very different perspectives.

So what compromise could there be to address all the concerns and yet still preserve the positive aspects of the TEF – i.e. the increasing focus on education and outcomes? I go back to BU’s response to the Green Paper, when we said that the TEF should model itself on the REF.. It should celebrate excellence wherever it is found, there should not be a link with tuition fees and there should be no forced ranking. To achieve that now, a remodelled TEF could include the following features:

no link to fees
have two rather than three levels of award – perhaps indicating good and outstanding. The last category is those who fail their quality assessment and don’t qualify for TEF.
take a different approach to benchmarking that does not force differentiation
include a place for commendations

I am not convinced by the argument that no-one would participate in the TEF without the direct financial incentive. That does not hold true for the REF. The REF has increased the focus on impact and had a beneficial impact on research. (We have some reservations about the changes proposed in the latest REF consultation, but that is a separate issue.) The concerns about the TEF would be mitigated substantially if the Olympic rating system and the link to fees were dropped. The sector would be able to engage in a much more constructive debate about subject-level TEF.

The TEF does not need to be thrown out completely – but this is an opportunity to go back to where this started from and ensure that the TEF brings focus on the quality of education and student outcomes.

January 14, 2017

Calling all RCUK PIs and Students!

Awarded & submitted bids, Post-award, Publishing, Research assessment sastringer

RCUK The next Researchfish submission period will run in February/March 2017. The key dates and policies for the 2017 exercise are detailed below…

Next Submission Period dates

PIs will need to log on to researchfish® and submit a return between the 6 February and 4pm on 16 March 2017 to confirm that their outcomes information is accurate and complete at that time. Students will once again be asked to submit their outcomes then too. It is important to note that this time there will not be a blanket extension given to those who don’t submit by the deadline.

Studentships outcomes collection

The last Submission Period was the first time that all RCUK-funded Students were asked provide research outcomes from their Studentship awards. After considering the information gathered and the feedback received, RCUK has decided in future only students who are in the third or later year of their studies need to submit their outcomes. For the 2017 submission period this means students whose awards started on or before the 5 February 2015.

Sanctions

As was the case after the 2016 Submission Period, non-compliant PIs will lose eligibility to be either a PI or Co-I on further awards from any Research Council and any current awards will have their payments withheld until such time as the PI becomes compliant. Sanctions will not apply to students who do not comply with the request to submit their outcomes.

January 9, 2017

HEFCE consultation on REF2021 – what you need to know

Research assessment Julie Northam

It hardly feels like the dust has settled on the results from the last Research Excellence Framework, yet here we are again – almost half way through another research assessment cycle with HEFCE proposing potential changes to the next exercise. It feels like I’ve been transported back to 2009 when HEFCE were running bibliometrics and impact pilots to inform REF2014. I have to remind myself that it is in fact 2017 and things have moved on. We are now talking about REF2021 (how time flies!) and HEFCE have launched a consultation on how this exercise might work. Whilst citations and impact are still on the agenda for discussion, they are joined by other substantial changes that, if adopted, will transform the shape and potentially outcome of the next exercise.

The proposed changes have been informed by Lord Stern’s independent review of the REF which was published last July. This made 12 recommendations on how the next REF could be strengthened, whilst reducing the bureaucracy and cost of running the exercise (read Jane Forster’s overview of the recommendations – Stern review of the REF: what next?). These recommendations have now been reviewed by the four UK HE funding bodies and, prior to Christmas, HEFCE published proposals to amend the REF to incorporate the recommendations. HEFCE’s proposals are now open for consultation with the sector.

The document itself is fairly lengthy and dense, and over 40 questions are put forward for consideration. The key proposals are:

All research-active staff to be submitted
The decoupling of staff from outputs
Outputs will no longer be portable across institutions
All outputs must be available in open access form (with some exceptions)
Impact will have a broader definition
Institutional environment narratives and case studies to be submitted

There are some excellent summaries available online, many of which provide thoughts on what the proposals could mean in practice. The following summaries are particularly informative and worth reading: HEFCE launches consultation on REF2021, Soft Stern or Hard Stern and Implementing REF2021.

BU will be submitting an institutional response to the consultation before the deadline of 17^th March. As these are significant proposals, all staff will have the opportunity to contribute to the response. As a number of the key questions would benefit from a discipline-level response, UoA teams (UoA leaders, impact champions and output champions) are calling meetings within Faculties to hold discussions related to their own UoA. These will take place over the next month or so. Contact a member of your UoA team for further information. Staff not based in Faculties are also invited to comment on the proposals and can do so via their Director/Head of Professional Service.

The are various REF-focused conferences and events taking place over the next few months, organised by HEFCE, ARMA, etc. Interesting news from these will be posted to the Research Blog. HEFCE are anticipating significant sector-wide engagement with the proposals and have committed to reading all feedback received. It is anticipated that, following the consultation, the initial decisions regarding the shape of REF2021 will be published in summer 2017.

December 14, 2016

Addressing BREXIT at Humboldt University in Germany

conferences, Research assessment lmiles

Professor Lee Miles was invited as the Professor of Crisis and Disaster Management to give an address to the Centre for British Studies at Humboldt University in Berlin (12 December 2016) – one of Germany’s most prestigious universities.

Lee’s lecture was entitled ‘A (Dif)Fusion Perspective on BREXIT Crisis Management: Reflections on a single market outside the Single Market?’. During the lecture, Lee examined the implications of the UK vote in 2016 to leave the European Union from a crisis management’s point of view, and as a process of ‘crisis alleviation’. Lee also combined these ideas with work on fusion theory in European Integration for which he is widely associated. He outlined the challenges of UK withdrawal from the European Union and considered a number of scenarios from the perspective of fusion/diffusion if the main terms of reference focus on being outside the Single European Market. Lee spoke to a packed audience and the address was very well received.

Lee Addressing the Centre for British Studies

Lee At Humboldt

December 11, 2016

Attention: All RCUK PIs and Students!

Awarded & submitted bids, Post-award, Publishing, Research assessment sastringer

The next Researchfish submission period will run in February/March 2017. The key dates and policies for the 2017 exercise are detailed below…

Next Submission Period dates

PIs will need to log on to researchfish® and submit a return between the 6 February and 4pm on 16 March 2017 to confirm that their outcomes information is accurate and complete at that time. Students will once again be asked to submit their outcomes then too. It is important to note that this time there will not be a blanket extension given to those who don’t submit by the deadline.

Studentships outcomes collection

The last Submission Period was the first time that all RCUK-funded Students were asked provide research outcomes from their Studentship awards. After considering the information gathered and the feedback received, RCUK has decided in future only students who are in the third or later year of their studies need to submit their outcomes. For the 2017 submission period this means students whose awards started on or before the 5 February 2015.

Sanctions

As was the case after the 2016 Submission Period, non-compliant PIs will lose eligibility to be either a PI or Co-I on further awards from any Research Council and any current awards will have their payments withheld until such time as the PI becomes compliant. Sanctions will not apply to students who do not comply with the request to submit their outcomes.

December 9, 2016

HE policy update

Fusion, international, Public engagement, REF Subjects, Research assessment jforster

Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF) and Research Excellence Framework (REF)

The Vice-Chancellor, Professor John Vinney, has a new blog on the HEPI (the Higher Education policy Institute) website on research and teaching and how REF and the TEF work together, with some proposals for change in how the REF is implemented in 2021, and views on subject level TEF, which is proposed for year 3 (informal consultation has already started).

And on Thursday afternoon the HEFCE REF consultation on the implementation of the REF 2021 was published – with a response date of 17 March 2017. The proposals incorporate the principles from the Stern Review. You can read the background on our BU Policy & Public Affairs page on the Stern Review. Wonkhe have a useful summary of the proposals and David Sweeney from HEFCE has written for Wonkhe on why the sector needs to engage in the consultation – contact policy@bournemouth.ac.uk if you would like to be involved in preparing our response, we will be working on this with RKEO.

Wonkhe have published an interesting analysis of the TEF metrics and benchmarking and how they work complete with data about the current likely outcomes of the TEF. Wonkhe report that Professor John Raftery, vice chancellor for London Metropolitan University, has written for the Telegraph on the TEF, calling for the metrics to include a measure for number of qualified teachers in universities – something BU also called for in our TEF consultation response.

An expert in dyslexia has written a blog for Wonkhe on potential benefits for disabled students as a result of the implementation of the Teaching Excellence Framework with its focus on “split” metrics.

Widening Participation and Social Mobility

A Social Mobility Commission report has been issued looking at social and ethnic inequalities in post-16 choices. It examines social gender and ethnic inequalities.

The report found significant differences between poorer children and wealthier children living in the same neighbourhood with the same GCSE results. This Government press release states that “bright children from poorer backgrounds are far less likely to go to university or study A levels that could get them into top universities than their wealthier counterparts – even if they live in the same neighbourhood and achieve similar results at GCSE.”

Some other key findings include:

24% of children eligible for free school meals attend higher education compared to 42% of children from more privileged backgrounds.
Poorer children are also twice as likely to drop out of education at 16 and are more than half as likely to study A levels that could get them into a top university.
around a quarter of the progression gap – the different choices made by children after leaving school – is purely down to social background.
White British students are far less likely to go to university than ethnic minority students – Indian (72%), Pakistani/Bangladeshi (53%), Black (57%) and White British (36%). Participation differences between White British and other ethnic groups who live in the same neighbourhood and with the same GCSE attainment are even more pronounced.
White British students are more likely to drop out of post-16 education than ethnic minority students – Indian (3%), Pakistani/Bangladeshi (8%), Black (7%) and White British (10%).
Female pupils are 8% more likely to attend university than males (44% versus 36%). However, although female participation rates at top selective universities are slightly higher (10% versus 9% for boys); they are less likely to attend these universities than a boy from the same neighbourhood with the same GCSEs.

Education Select Committee Inquiry into the effect of Brexit on staff and students in HE

Our evidence has been published as part of 190 submissions to the committee. You can read the submissions through links here (click on “view all”).

Neil Carmichael MP, Chair of the Education Committee, said: “This written evidence from university leaders, academics, businesses and others highlights the degree of concern about the fate of UK universities post-Brexit. The evidence raises a variety of issues relating to freedom of movement, including the prospects for recruiting EU students post-Brexit and the future rights of EU staff to live and work in the UK. Concerns are also raised about how to maintain the UK as an attractive destination for EU and international students, about the financial viability of universities, and the need to ensure Britain can continue to compete on the international stage as a provider of world-class university education.

In our inquiry, we are determined to examine the opportunities for higher education post-Brexit and consider what the Government’s priorities should be for the sector going into the negotiations with the EU. It’s crucial that we don’t allow Brexit to become a catastrophe for our university sector. We look forward to testing the evidence and questioning university leaders, academics, students, unions, and Ministers in our public evidence sessions in the New Year.”

Higher Education and Research Bill reaches the Lords

The HE and Research Bill had its second reading in the House of Lords on 7th December and has now moved to the Lords Committee stage. Research Professional have a summary. You can read the full debate in Hansard here and a summary by DODs here.

At the committee stage amendments will be tabled and discussed in great detail. The Bill has only had government amendments approved so far, and there has been a lot of criticism (of and by everyone) of the level of scrutiny so far – with time being severely limited in committee and third reading stage in the Commons, with all opposition amendments rejected. But as you saw from my update on the third reading in the Commons, the debate there centred largely on Brexit, student visas, TEF, and loans (none of which are actually covered by the Bill), with very little actual focus on the bill itself.

It is expected that the Lords, while they will discuss those issues as well, will also focus on the bill itself, particularly on the changes to the research landscape, but also on degree awarding powers and other aspects of autonomy – and that was reflected in the debate, as well as discussions about the TEF.

UUK have update their briefing note to focus on what they want from the Lords – read it here – it lists the same 7 issues as for the House of Commons third reading, so it is interesting to see that they have flagged three in particular in a joint letter to the Guardian with GuildHE, calling for the Lords to amend the Bill to address probationary degree awarding powers, to stop the OfS validating degrees and to stop the government interfering in academic standards and course funding.

It has long been expected that fees, loans and linking TEF to fees, will be a feature of the Lords debate – Wes Streeting wrote about student loan repayment yesterday: Wes Streeting MP: Labour Lords will fight student loan repayment ‘scandal’.

UCU Survey: Inaccuracies in predicted grades

The UCU undergraduate application and admission survey tackles the disparity between predicted and actual A level grades achieved. It reports only 16% of predictions (2013-15) were correct with the majority of students predicted higher than they achieve, identifies differences in under/over prediction depending on the type of institution, and notes differences surrounding disadvantaged students. The Guardian quotes Sally Hunt (UCU) “this report is a damning indictment of a broken system” and references the underpinning study by Dr Gill Wyness (University College London Institute of Education) “it seems highly inefficient to continue with a system in which life-changing decisions are made, and scarce university places are allocated, on the basis of inaccurate information”. THE pick up on the socio-economic angle of high achieving disadvantaged students who are under predicted and state it may be skewing their access to highly selective universities. UCU are calling for an overhaul and recommend a post-qualification admissions system. .

Something a bit different

The House of Commons Science and Technology Committee has decided to create an open opportunity for the science community and the wider public to suggest science and technology areas for scrutiny. Inquiry: My Science Inquiry

Inquiry proposals will be considered on the basis of merit, and the Committee would be interested to receive proposals for work in areas that might otherwise escape its attention. Proposals should outline in less than 200 words the nature of the issue that the Committee should explore, why it deserves attention, and how Government policy in this area could be developed or improved. A selection of the proposals will be shortlisted for an opportunity to give a 10-minute pitch to the Committee in person at a public ‘Dragons’ Den’-style session to be held in the New Year. Please contact policy@bournemouth.ac.uk if you are interested in contributing – the deadline is 4^th January 2017.

December 5, 2016

How to Write a 4* Article

BRIAN, Guidance, Publishing, REF Subjects, Research assessment, Training, writing sastringer

Prof. Mark Reed

A fortnight ago Prof Mark Reed, Professor of Socio-Technical Innovation at Newcastle University and the man behind Fast Track Impact, tweeted some thoughts on how to write a 4* paper for the REF. He went on to explain his thinking in more detail in a guest post on the Research Fundementals blog, the post is published here with the authors permission.

_____________
How do you write a 4* paper for the Research Excellence Framework (REF)? It is a question I’ve asked myself with some urgency since the Stern Review shredded my REF submission by not allowing me to bring my papers with me this year to my new position at Newcastle University.

Obviously the answer is going to differ depending on your discipline, but I think there are a few simple things that everyone can do to maximize their chances of getting a top graded research output.

I’m going to start with the assumption that you’ve actually done original, significant and rigorous work – if you haven’t then there is no point in reading any further. However, as I am increasingly asked to pre-review papers for colleagues across a range of disciplines, I am seeing examples of people who write up work as a 2* or 3* paper that has the potential to get a better score. I should point out that I believe that there is an important role for 1* and 2* papers, and that I regularly write these on purpose to address a problem of national significance and frame it for the specific, narrow audience that is likely to be able to benefit most from my work. However, whether I like it or not, as a Professor in a research-intensive University, there is an expectation that I will be submitted as a 4* researcher, which means I need a few 4* papers as well.

You can see some more detailed thoughts on what I think makes 4* for different types of paper in this Tweet:

How to write a 4* paper for #REF pic.twitter.com/7P8fKw1pfU

— Mark Reed (@profmarkreed) November 23, 2016

As you’ll see from the discussion under that tweet though, my more detailed thoughts probably only apply to Units of Assessment across panels A-C, and probably isn’t relevant to the arts and humanities.

Having said this, I think there are a number of things we can all do to maximize the chances of our work being viewed favourably by REF panelists.

Write to the criteria: when I was learning to drive, my instructor told me that in the test I should make sure I moved my head when I was looking in the rear view mirror, to make sure the examiner noticed I was using my mirrors. We’re all used to writing to the criteria of funding calls, and in fact we are all perfectly used to writing papers to the criteria of our target journals. In the last REF, research outputs were judged against three criteria: originality, significance and rigour. Whatever the interpretation of these criteria in your discipline, have you made it explicit to REF panelists reading your work exactly what is original, and why it is so original? Have you explained and effectively justified the significance of your work? And have you included evidence that your methods, analysis and interpretation is rigorous, even if you have to use supplementary material to include extra detail about your methods and data to get around journal word limits?

Get REF feedback before you submit your work for publication: find out who is going to be reviewing research outputs for REF internally within your Unit of Assessment at your institution and ask them to review your work before you submit it. They may be able to make recommendations about how you might improve the paper in light of the REF criteria. Sometimes a little bit of extra work on the framing of your research in relation to wider contexts and issues can help articulate the significance of your work, and with additional reading and thinking, you may be able to position your work more effectively in relation to previous work to demonstrate its originality more clearly. Adding a few extra details to your methods and results may re-assure readers and reviewers that your approach is indeed rigorous. This is not just about doing world-leading research; it is about demonstrating to the world that your work is indeed world-leading. For me, these criteria are nothing new and are worth paying attention to, whether or not we are interested in REF. Meeting these three criteria will increase the chances that you get through peer-review and will increase the likelihood that your work gets cited.

Analyse and discuss good practice in your own area: the only way to really “get your eye in” for REF is to actually look at examples of good and poor practice in your own area. Below, I’ve described how you can design an exercise to do this with your colleagues. You can do it yourself and learn a lot, but from my own experience, you learn a lot more by doing this as a discussion exercise with colleagues who work in your area. If you can, take notes from your discussion and try and distill some of the key lessons, so you can learn collectively as a group and more effectively review and support each others’ work.

How to organize a discussion to work out what makes a 4* paper in your area:

Identify top scoring institutions for your Unit of Assessment (UOA): download the REF2014 results, filter for your UOA (columns E or F), then filter so it only shows you the outputs (column J), and then filter for 4* (column L), showing only the institutions from your UOA that had the highest percentage of 4* outputs. Now for those institutions, look across the table (columns L-P) to see which has the highest proportion of outputs at either 3* or 4*. For example, an institution may have 80% of its outputs graded at 4* and 15% graded at 3*, meaning that 95% of its outputs were graded at 3-4*
Download a selection of papers from the top scoring institutions: go to your UOA on the REF website, find and click on the institutions you’ve identified in step 1, under “view submission data”, click on “research outputs”, copy and paste output titles into Google Scholar (or your search engine of choice) and download the articles. You may want to select outputs randomly, or you may want to go through more selectively, identifying outputs that are close to the areas your group specialize in
Repeat for low scoring institutions so you can compare and contrast high and low scoring outputs
Discuss examples: print copies of the high and low scoring outputs, labeled clearly, and in your next UOA meeting, let everyone choose a high and a low-scoring example. Given them 10-15 minutes to quickly read the outputs (focusing on title, abstract, introduction, figures and conclusions so you’re not there all day) and then ask the group (or small groups if there are many of you) to discuss the key factors that they think distinguish between high and low scoring outputs. Get your group(s) to distill the key principles that they think are most useful and disseminate these more widely to the group, so that anyone who wasn’t present can benefit.

It would be great if I could tell you that these are my “three easy ways to get a 4* paper” but doing work that is genuinely original, significant and rigorous is far from easy. If you have done work that is of the highest quality though, I hope that the ideas I’ve suggested here will help you get the credit you deserve for the great research you’ve done.

November 24, 2016

Calling all RCUK PIs and Students!

Awarded & submitted bids, Post-award, Publishing, Research assessment sastringer

We’ve been informed by RCUK that the next Researchfish submission period will run in February/March 2017. The key dates and policies for the 2017 exercise are detailed below…

Next Submission Period dates

PIs will need to log on to researchfish® and submit a return between the 6 February and 4pm on 16 March 2017 to confirm that their outcomes information is accurate and complete at that time. Students will once again be asked to submit their outcomes then too. It is important to note that this time there will not be a blanket extension given to those who don’t submit by the deadline.

Studentships outcomes collection

The last Submission Period was the first time that all RCUK-funded Students were asked provide research outcomes from their Studentship awards. After considering the information gathered and the feedback received, RCUK has decided in future only students who are in the third or later year of their studies need to submit their outcomes. For the 2017 submission period this means students whose awards started on or before the 5 February 2015.

Sanctions

As was the case after the 2016 Submission Period, non-compliant PIs will lose eligibility to be either a PI or Co-I on further awards from any Research Council and any current awards will have their payments withheld until such time as the PI becomes compliant. Sanctions will not apply to students who do not comply with the request to submit their outcomes.

Category / Research assessment

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Attention: All RCUK PIs and Students!

HE policy update

How to Write a 4* Article

Calling all RCUK PIs and Students!

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