"What do you do if your country has a serious problem with bullying and harassment in academic research? The United Kingdom is among those with such a problem, as acknowledged by its largest public funding body, UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), in an evidence review that was published in 2019 (see go.nature.com/48mehd9). The future of universities The answer should not be that research culture isn't important enough to qualify for assessment in official measures of universities' research excellence."
"Yet that is how many are interpreting the government's decision, three months ago, to hit pause on UKRI's plans to assess the quality of research culture as part of its Research Excellence Framework (REF), a periodic assessment of universities' performance. Whether a government should have the power to interfere directly in how research is assessed is, in itself, highly questionable."
Bullying and harassment are serious problems in UK academic research, acknowledged by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) in a 2019 evidence review. Research culture should qualify for assessment in official measures of universities' research excellence. The government's pause on incorporating research culture into the Research Excellence Framework (REF) is being interpreted as deprioritization of culture. Governments are increasingly intervening in decisions traditionally made by researchers, raising concerns about political interference. The REF team faces pressure to maintain proposed measures and must be supported by researchers to avoid undermining ongoing efforts to recognize and address poor behaviour. The REF drives funding allocation through a star-rating system.
Read at Nature
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]