Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA) Proposed to Replace Still Born RQF. (February 27, 2008)

In a brief media release the Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research, Kim Carr, yesterday announced his outline for a new research quality and evaluation system.

The department states: "The Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA) initiative, to be developed by the Australian Research Council (ARC) in conjunction with the Department of Innovation, Industry, Science and Research (DIISR), will assess research quality using a combination of metrics and expert review by committees comprising experienced, internationally-recognised experts."

Senator Carr said: "ERA will use leading researchers to evaluate research activity progressively in each of the ARC discipline clusters and several clusters covering health and medical research that will be informed by experts from the National Health and Medical Research Council [NHMRC].

"Each cluster report will detail by institution and by discipline those areas that are internationally competitive, together with emerging areas where there are opportunities for development and further investment."

According to the senator, the ERA is to start with those disciplines where the metrics were most widely accepted, for example, in the physical and biological sciences.

"In parallel, we will continue consultation with other disciplines about metrics appropriate to their disciplines, noting that some measures will be appropriate to all disciplines and that for all disciplines expert review of the metrics is essential."

Of immediate interest is Senator Carr's announcement that until the ERA was fully developed, the current arrangements for the block grants funding will be maintained and would remain the responsibility of the DIISR. Future arrangements will be determined in consultation with the sector.

He told The Australian's Bernard Lane: "You need peer review (to judge research quality): peer review is the fundamental instrument for keeping everyone honest."

The planning is to be supervised by the six-member ARC advisory council designated by Senator Carr early last month.

The council is to publish an issues paper soon after its first meeting scheduled for March 5.

"We want to tie this to the ARC processes to reduce duplication for the universities and the researchers," the minister told Mr Lane while ARC chief executive Margaret Sheil, a former deputy vice-chancellor for research at the University of Wollongong, told him: "We're trying to get the best possible information (on research quality) with the minimal amount of work for everybody."

Bradley Smith, the executive director of the Federation of Australian Scientific and Technological Societies (FASTS) in an initial comment said: "We welcome the inclusion of a peer review mechanism to moderate and provide context for research metrics.  Even within the  sciences there is considerable variation of outputs and relative importance of particular metrics. An expert panel providing light-touch validation of metrics is the most appropriate way to provide fair evaluation. Clearly we will need to see a lot more detail as the ERA is developed but this appears to be a less bureaucratic approach than the RQF [Research Quality Framework]."

Senator Carr also confirmed to Mr Lane that "the contentious measure of research impact proposed for the RQF would be abandoned".

Professor Stuart Cunningham, President of the Council for the Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences (CHASS), said that Senator Carr's: "[N]ew approach appears to be committed to a sensible balance between metrics and expert review. The Minister will achieve his objective of a more streamlined approach by using the well-credentialed assessment resources of the ARC."

Professor Conningham said: "CHASS looks forward to being actively involved in helping establish the new system, and playing a positive part in a new way of measuring research quality in Australia."

Universities Australia, (the Australian Vice-Chancellors Committee (AVCC) as was), is reported to welcome the development of a metrics-based system to replace the RQF. Its CEO, Dr Glenn Withers, said the association was pleased to see that emerging areas of research are being recognised: "Senator Carr has indicated a discipline-based system of research quality evaluation and Universities Australia would be keen to ensure that this system does not disadvantage interdisciplinary research. While this early definition of the ERA is welcome, Universities Australia now seeks active consultation with government on the development of the ERA system, the linkages to funding and how the so called 'hubs and spokes' model will operate."

What remains to be seen is whether or not DIISR and the ARC's advisory council will really be able to break the straight jacket of Britain's Research Assessment Exercise, and focus on the PI's and their teams per se together with redesigning the system to properly fund on-costs. Not to do so will continue the inflexibility that is confining Australian Research.

If the system is designed properly, and given sufficient time, it will bring about naturally the areas of excellence so keenly sought by the federal government. To try and force the issue from Canberra will be courting further degradation, and the more important multidisciplinary research becomes the more evident that will be.