Tagged / survey

RKEDF Survey – 3 days to go!

Training

It’s been over six months since Bournemouth University launched its new Research & Knowledge Exchange Development Framework, which was designed to offer academics at all stages of their career opportunities to develop their skills, knowledge and capabilities.

Since its launch, over 30 sessions have taken place, including sandpits designed to develop solutions to key research challenges, workshops with funders such as the British Academy and the Medical Research Council and skills sessions to help researchers engage with the media and policy makers.

The Research & Knowledge Exchange Office is currently planning activities and sessions for next year’s training programme and would like your feedback about what’s worked well, areas for improvement and suggestions for new training sessions.

Tell us what you think via our survey and be in with a chance of winning a £30 Amazon voucher. The deadline date is Friday 21 April.

Upcoming sessions:

  4 April Public engagement: an overview
  13 April Getting started on applying for research funding
  25 April How to update your Staff Profile Page using BRIAN
  9 May Writing Academy – Writing Day
  10 May Using social media to share your research
  18 May Targeting high quality journals
  18 May Writing an academic paper
  18 May Writing a good abstract
  18 May Dealing with editors
  24 May Research Data Management
  24 May Introduction to the Royal Society
  24 May My publication story so far… Prof. Tim Rees
  25 May Writing Academy – Writing Day

Postgraduate Researcher Experience Survey (PRES)

PG research

The Graduate School would like to remind all PGRs (on behalf of SUBU) that the BU/SUBU Postgraduate Researcher Experience Survey (PRES) is now open. It is an opportunity for PGRs to tell us about their experiences as a PGR student, which will help us identify areas of good practice and areas in which we could improve.  The closing date is 1 November 2016 – see link below.

PRES is an important anonymous survey which speaks out for BU PGRs only, and has been developed in consultation with BU PGR students to make it relevant to PhD, MPhil and MRes students here.

Feedback from last year’s survey helped us to, amongst other things:

  • Improve the processes for administrative support
  • Explore how to make the faculty research environment more stimulating
  • Improve communication about how to apply for funding for specialist resources

The more responses we receive, the more we can do for PGRs.  If you are a BU PGR, please help us by sparing a few moments to fill in the survey:

https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/BU_PGR_Student_Experience_2016

UK Intellectual Property Office survey on training

Knowledge Exchange

survey

The UK Intellectual Property Office (IPO) is conducting a short survey to understand the opportunities available for PhD students and early career researchers to learn about managing intellectual property (IP).

It is anitipated  that the results of the survey will highlight best practice as well as identify any skills and knowledge gaps. This will help to inform the development of any future activities or programmes to support IP management in knowledge exchange and commercialisation.

The IPO are interested in receiving responses from a broad range of stakeholders and are particularly keen to hear from PhD students, early career researchers, academics and professionals involved in knowledge exchange, commercialisation and PhD training.

The survey is completely voluntary, and all information will be held securely in accordance with the Data Protection Act.

To complete the survey please click on the following link: https://response.questback.com/intellectualpropertyoffice/ipsurvey.

The survey will close on Wednesday 31 August.

Research Blog Survey

Here at RKEO we are always trying to improve the services and information we provide to our audience and the research blog has been our main tool for communicating news to our audience. The research blog has been running since its first post back in March 2011, which makes it a strong 5 years old!

With this historic achievement of age it doesn’t  mean that there isn’t room for improvement. If you have the time it would be greatly appreciated if you could fill out thisquick survey about the research blog. This will allow us to improve the site and in turn provide a better service for you!

21FD6083B5F5C05F6562C774DBE189B9

Research Blog Survey

Here at RKEO we are always trying to improve the services and information we provide to our audience and the research blog has been our main tool for communicating news to our audience. The research blog has been running since its first post back in March 2011, which makes it a strong 5 years old!

With this historic achievement of age it doesn’t  mean that there isn’t room for improvement. If you have the time it would be greatly appreciated if you could fill out this quick survey about the research blog. This will allow us to improve the site and in turn provide a better service for you!

21FD6083B5F5C05F6562C774DBE189B9

Research Blog Survey

Here at RKEO we are always trying to improve the services and information we provide to our audience and the research blog has been our main tool for communicating news to our audience. The research blog has been running since its first post back in March 2011, which makes it a strong 5 years old!

With this historic achievement of age it doesn’t  mean that there isn’t room for improvement. If you have the time it would be greatly appreciated if you could fill out this quick survey about the research blog. This will allow us to improve the site and in turn provide a better service for you!

21FD6083B5F5C05F6562C774DBE189B9

Research Blog Survey

Here at RKEO we are always trying to improve the services and information we provide to our audience and the research blog has been our main tool for communicating news to our audience. The research blog has been running since its first post back in March 2011, which makes it 5 years old this month!

With this historic achievement of age it doesn’t  mean that there isn’t room for improvement. If you have the time it would be greatly appreciated if you could fill out this quick survey about the research blog. This will allow us to improve the site and in turn provide a better service for you!

21FD6083B5F5C05F6562C774DBE189B9

Results of RKEO pre-award survey

Guidance

The RKEO restructured in September 2014 and part of this was the newly formed Funding Development Team (FDT), who administer all things pre-award.  As there was disruption to the team in the summer of 2014 and the majority of the team were new to RKEO (and some were new to BU), we recognised that our service levels needed improving.  As a result, we have asked academics who have submitted applications to complete surveys so that we can seek to improve our service and have a way of monitoring this.FDT

The last survey was run in June and the general response was positive and recognised that we were making great improvements.  There were recommendations on what we could do further and we will take these forward.  The academics were asked to score our performance on a variety of topics and the results are given below:

Scores on the doors (1 = poor and 5 = excellent)

Demonstrate a good knowledge of the funder/ client 4.47
Have a good understanding of the bidding/ contract process – 4.69
Generate the costings and explain how the costs were derived 4.71
Demonstrate a high level of expertise 4.47
Answer all of your questions 4.63
Provide timely information 4.38
Keep you informed of progress 4.5
Respond quickly to your calls and emails 4.35
Help you to submit your bid/proposal on time 4.69
How would you rate the service provided by RKEO 4.4
Overall, would you say that your expectations were met – All said ‘yes’
Were you aware of the internal processes and timescales when applying for funding before you approached RKEO? 13 out of 17 said yes

These are great results which were also backed up with positive comments about our service.  Some of these are given below:

General comments

‘Regarding RKEO I think the team works great; I can just say thank you very much and please keep it up. I do apologize for the time and complexity constraints which were out of my hands.’

‘When I was contacted by my colleagues I expected that it may be a bit complicated because the time frame was short, yet it was a unique chance I should not miss. I was concerned on that and I wasn’t sure if it would be possible at all in the end. Thanks to the RKEO team work, it was possible.’

‘We are really lucky to have colleagues here to help us in such a professional manner. Applying for funding can be really stressful so what you need is someone to guide you and explain the process to you. Jenny and Ehren were so good, I am indebted to them.’

‘Excellent –  Jason was very professional and knowledgeable’

‘Considerable improvement over the last nine months.’

‘ (A score of) 5 what else? They were there for me and couldn’t ask for more.‘

‘As a result of this experience of submitting a bid (and particularly because of the support offered by RKEO) I definitely feel more confident about submitting larger bids in the future. I’ve seen how much support RKEO will be able to give me.’

Timeframe for processing applications comments:

‘It was processed much quicker than I expected and the RKEO team work, in particular the work of Ms Kerri Jones was great; not only met my expectations but exceeded them by large margins. If the submission was successful it is primarily thanks to her.’

‘Extremely quickly – it exceeded my expectations.  I’d left everything to the last minute (I’d almost decided not to bother bidding) but Ehren was able to process my application extremely quickly to enable me to meet the deadline.’

 ‘It has been great and grateful that Dianne and her colleagues helped out with very short notice and handled the requests in a professional and efficient manner.‘

This feedback helps the team to know that what they are doing is appreciated and worthwhile and we thank the academics for their support and recognition.  We don’t rest on our laurels though and we will be making changes to the process over the summer.  These will aim to speed up the process and ensure that procedures are clearer.  More information will follow on this and so watch this space.

Signpost with the words Help, Support, Advice, Guidance and Assistance on the direction arrows, against a bright blue cloudy sky.

Post Graduate Researchers at BU, your say!

PG research

From today, all members of the post-graduate research community are invited to complete the BU Post Graduate Researchers Experience Survey (2014-15) or the Arrivals Survey, for recent starters. This is a vitally important opportunity for you all to share your thoughts, views and opinions about working at BU. Your responses will help us to discover what is working well and what you think could be improved.

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/PGR_Experience_Survey_2014-15

 Post-graduates in every school and faculty play an important role in helping to improve the research profile of BU, whilst bringing many unique talents and abilities to the research environment. As such, it’s important that you feel valued and able to do your best at the University.

 The most recent PGR survey took place in 2013, being performed every two years, on the national scale. This allowed PGRs to share their views and engage on a wide range of important topics such as specialist resources, research skills, professional developments and support for teaching.  This new, annual survey has been developed by BU with our own PGR’s in mind, having been specifically tailored to your requirements, based on your feedback.

 The 2014 PGR survey will be distributed by email this week, so please take 15 minutes of your time to answer the questions and consider it as part of your normal working day. Once the results of the survey are collated towards the end of the year, we will build on this feedback, to find out how we are progressing and to help identify those areas where there is still work to be done.

 It’s also important to say that the survey is totally anonymous.

 I urge you to take the time to fill in the survey and have your say about issues that directly affect you. Your responses are essential to help us improve and grow as a workplace and as a University.

Remember the deadline for completion of the survey is the 27th of October 2014.

The SUBU Research and Information Team.

Your chance to influence research and knowledge exchange support at BU – deadline looming

R & KE Operations

The deadline is looming for your chance to influence how you receive research and knowledge exchange support! The RKE Operations team are implementing improvements to the way we work and we want your feedback. Contribute by completing this short survey https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/GTHQG3F by 9th February 2014 – and we’ll do our best to make sure you receive the kind of support you want.

Jenny Roddis

Grade Grubbing – survey open

Steph Allen in the Media School is starting the UK pilot on the topic of Grade Grubbing (grade enhancement) and is looking for academic colleagues (both at BU and external to BU) to complete a survey on the topic. Is this has happened to you in the past, or if you think it might happen in the future bearing in mind that students are now seeing themselves as customers, then she’d appreciate you spending a few moments completing a short, anonymous pilot survey.

You can access the survey here:http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/ZCJD7BG

Voice your concens about EU research budget cuts

The next summit of the European Union is on November 22nd. It is at this summit the EU research budget for the next seven years will be determined.  Several Member States are demanding severe cuts on the total EU budget and research will have to compete with other policy priorities.

An open letter signed by European Nobel laureates has been published in top European newspapers and a mobilization of the national scientific communities is underway to object to these cuts. To help contribute to this, an online petition coordinated by the Initiative for Science in Europe has been launched which you can sign.

EC asks ICT firms why they don’t participate in funding programmes

Regular readers of the EU section of this blog will know that I harp on all the time about the importance of company engagement as partners in Horizon 2020. Well, this is becoming more and more apparent as time draws near to the first set of drafts for the new Horizon 2020 programme.

It was announced this month that the EC is funding a survey as part of a drive to increase the participation of companies from the information and communications technologies in future research programmes.

The survey aims to identify and characterise highly innovative ICT companies that do not participate in Framework projects, and assess why. The knowledge gained will be used to improve firms’ participation in Horizon 2020.

Now is the time to start making links with industry as much as you can!

AHRC seeking opinions on international collaboration

AHRC logoThe Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) are currently carrying out a survey to gather vital information about International collaborations. The survey will allow the AHRC to gain a greater understanding of existing International partnerships, and gain input from the Arts and Humanities’ research community on where further links may need to be developed.

This is your opportunity to inform the AHRC of your experience in International collaboration and feed into the on-going development of the AHRC’s international activities.

This survey is aimed at UK based researchers eligible for AHRC funding, and will take no more than 10 minutes to complete. The deadline for submission is 10th July 2011.

All responses will be greatly appreciated, and will be used to inform the continuing development of the AHRC’s International activities and opportunities.

Please click here to undertake the survey.

Search for a Champion? Or BU Research Themes

Thank you to all those people who responded to the online questionnaire about the BU Research Themes.  There were 273 responses!  On this basis we can reduce the short list of twelve societal themes down to ten as set out in the briefing paper (available from  – I:\CRKT\Public\RDU\Research themes\Paper.docx).  The ten are:

  • Health and wellbeing
  • Recreation and leisure
  • Culture and society or Society & Social Change
  • Environmental change and biodiversity
  • Green economy and sustainability
  • Creative and digital economies
  • Aging
  • Learning and public engagement
  • Entrepreneurship and economic growth
  • Technology and design

We urgently need some champions to ‘flesh-out’ these themes to help scope them and allow us to ‘road test’ them further.  I am looking for as many views as possible for each theme; just fill out the template (available from  – I:\CRKT\Public\Research themes\Form.doc) and e-mail it back to me.  The idea is to then distill these views and produce a scope for each; if there are no champions forthcoming then we may be able to reduce the list further.  I need the templates back by the 27 May if possible; thank you!

Matthew Bennett

PVC (Research, Enterprise & Internationalisation)

(The documents are saved to the I-drive. If you are on-campus then you need to copy and paste the file pathway into an internet browser. If you are unable to access them please contact Julie Northam who will email you the documents).