My (unpublished) Letter to the Guardian, July 28th, 2015
James Wilsdon writes “In defence of the REF” (Guardian, July 27th (2015)), as opposed to the IEA’s call for quality-related funding of scientific and other research. But neither scheme takes account the known fact that most of the major advances in science have come from research that originally seemed to have nothing to do with the eventual application (see, for example, Sir John Cadogan’s recent report http://learnedsocietywales.ac.uk/sites/default/files/Curiosity-driven%20Blue%20Sky%20Research%20WEB%20LSW.pdf).
As I have argued recently on Australian television, the answer is to fund diverse networks of science, rather than just individual projects (https://lenfisherscience.com/tv-interview-we-need-to-fund-diverse-networks-of-science/). Only in this way will science be persuaded to yield up its true benefits.
REF? QR? A plague on both their houses.
Len Fisher
University of Bristol
UPDATE 25.6.2017 I wish now to add the appalling TEF teaching ratings to the targets for this rant. As pointed out by Phil_Baty on Twitter “Bronze TEF ratings indicate universities meet “rigorous national quality requirements”. The headlines, however say “third rate.” As pointed out by Dorothy Bishop, FRS (@deevybee) “It was BLINDINGLY OBVIOUS that this would happen; the media love to bash universities & TEF gives perfect excuse” Of course we need good teaching, but the lesson already is that TEF is the worst way to ensure it.
Thanks for the support, Len.
One interesting feature of discussion is that it is widely stated, even by those who are not really into metrics etc, that the REF has been a great success in improving UK research. The evidence that is given has to do with proportions of publications and numbers of citations that come from the UK.
My concern is that we may with hindsight come to see that the REF prompted an explosion of research activity but with a reduction of research quality. We now live in an academic environment where everyone is expected to be producing ‘groundbreaking’, ‘internationally significant’, ‘transformational’ research, and the incentives to cut corners are very strong. In scientific disciplines, there is growing concern that many publications, even in high impact journals, may have results that don’t replicate. Whether this is a consequence of REF it’s impossible to say, but I think it is possible that pressures on people to be ‘research active’ may have been counterproductive.
Agree very much with your comment on REF. Anyone who has been actively involved in research will be well aware that a) the ‘value” is almost impossible to measure, and any realistic measure will be very non-linear and b) assessment needs to be based on (often unreliable, but the best we have) judgement about un-measurable things like the ability and insight of the researcher. These are very complex issues. I wonder how well ANY measurement criteria would have done in evaluating Einstein in the earlier and latter parts of his career?