Determining university research funding through the Research Excellence Framework is expensive and bureaucratic. It’s time to consider a less complex and costly mechanism
Virtually all UK universities undertake a variety of research activity across the range of subject areas, leading to the creation of new knowledge and, hopefully, benefits to society. In undertaking research they have potential access to three main streams of research funding:
- Public funding provided for research purposes by the various higher education funding councils in the UK (the so-called QR or quality-related funding). This funding is not provided in the form of grants for specific research projects but is a stream of research funding given to universities and over which they have considerable discretion as to how it should be used. For the UK as a whole this funding is approaching £2bn per annum
- Public funding provided by the various research councils that provide grants for specific research projects and programmes. Total research council funding amounts to some £3bn per annum
- Funding from various other private, public and charitable sources that also provide grant-related funding.
The QR funding allocations to universities are now to be informed (not decided) by a process called the Research Excellence Framework (REF), which is an exercise designed to assess the volume and quality of research output from universities. The current REF is the seventh such exercise (previous exercises went under the title of Research Assessment Exercise or RAE).
At the time of writing, universities are enmeshed in the current REF process, which involves expert peer review of their research activity. Universities are invited to make submissions as to their research outputs for the previous five-year period with the greatest emphasis being placed on the publication of research papers by academic staff, which are largely read by other academics and with possible little real relevance to the outside world. A panel of academic experts reviews these submissions and an overall research profile for the university is decided. These profiles then inform future QR funding for the years ahead.
The REF is a very bureaucratic process that involves significant time and cost inputs by: the funding councils, the universities themselves and the expert panels. In 2003 I undertook an exercise that estimated the costs of the 2001 RAE exercise as being of the order of £100m for the HE sector as a whole. This equated to almost 10% of the annual funding available at that time. There seems no reason to believe that the current REF is any less bureaucratic or costly to operate.
Somebody once said that you don’t make a pig any fatter by measuring it. Perhaps the same applies to the REF. The effort expended on this bureaucratic and time-consuming exercise might better be spent improving the volume and quality of research output. Moreover the ‘quality’ of research output is itself assessed in relation to narrow academic criteria rather than the benefits produced by the research to society at large.
There are other issues too. Concerns are often expressed that the whole REF process is just a device designed to protect the older and better-funded universities from predatory newcomers or even private research organisations. Finally, there is little in the way of competitive forces in action with this process. With research council funding, universities do have to submit bids in competition with other universities and funding is given to the most suitable applicant.
Since 1996 the main university trade union has maintained a policy of opposition to the RAE/REF approach. In its view:
‘The RAE has had a disastrous impact on the UK higher education system, leading to the closure of departments with strong research profiles and healthy student recruitment. It has been responsible for job losses, discriminatory practices, widespread demoralisation of staff, the narrowing of research opportunities through the over-concentration of funding and the undermining of the relationship between teaching and research.’
It is too late to do anything about the current REF process, but thought will soon be given to its successor. In this time of financial austerity, perhaps we should start thinking about having less complex and costly mechanisms for sharing out funds and look for something more likely to give value for money.
One alternative approach might be to do away with the whole QR funding process and channel all the funding through the research councils. In this way, government can more easily concentrate research funding in what are seen priority areas. Another approach might be to base research funding on some easily produced metrics, which also has the advantage of greater transparency and objectivity compare to the current approach.
