Government Social Research
British government proposals
to overhaul the way academic research is funded could result in a redistribution
of money among universities, with top centres such as Cambridge and Durham
losing funds, while some newer institutions gain funds.
Higher Education Minister, Bill Rammell, has said that the existing Research Assessment Exercise (RAE), which uses peer review to determine how more than £1bn in funding is divided among universities each year, would be held for the last time in 2008. In its place, the government wants a more straightforward system that focuses on "metrics," or statistical analyses of outcomes. For subjects like science, engineering, and medicine, funders would use levels of external research income to calculate government funding.
A working group, put together by the government, developed five different proposals for how the new system might work. When the Higher Education Funding Council for England evaluated those proposals, it found that universities such as Durham, Cambridge, and Manchester could lose millions of pounds of funding each year. However, others such as the University of Greenwich and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine could gain a similar amount each year, thanks to their relatively high levels of external funding.
Links within the full article
DFES: Reform of higher education research assessment and funding
H. Gavaghan, "Mixed reaction to RAE proposals," The Scientist, June 6, 2003.
HEFCE: Reform of higher education research assessment and funding
Campaign for Science and Engineering
Universities UK
The full article can be viewed on The Scientist website