Annual review meetings
The annual Research Monitoring exercise was undertaken through meetings held for each UoA from circa 2001 until 2020. It included, amongst other things, the nomination and review of publications and other research outputs. From 2021/22, these are being structured into annual review meetings for departments.
Following a REF2021 lessons learned exercise, the Research and Impact Executive Committee (RIEC) considered the nature, scope and purpose of the university research monitoring exercises recognising its vital contributions to our REF2014 and REF2021 preparations. In response to the lessons learned exercise, it was agreed that the new annual review meetings (a specific name to be confirmed through consultation) would be undertaken principally at departmental level and would take a phased approach over the course of a REF cycle focusing on different aspects of research performance and culture in a given year. However, each year, a panel chaired by the DVC Research and Impact will meet to consider departmental research strategy and research and innovation grants performance.
For 2021/22, these meetings will be held in June and July 2022 and will be structured as per the 2021/22 departmental/College structures. In addition to the DVC Research and Impact the meetings will include: the PVC of the College, the College Associate Dean for Research, the Head of Department, the Director of Research and Director of Impact, the Director of Research Services and the Director of IIB. The PVC of the relevant Faculty within which the department will be located from 2022/23 will also be invited.
Research Monitoring involved the relevant College Executive (or multiple College Executives if the UoA falls between colleges) and at discipline level the Directors of Research and Impact and, where required, the Heads of Disciplines. The meetings were chaired by Professor Neil Gow, DVC for Research and Impact who also chaired a panel comprising the Dean of the Doctoral College, the relevant Pro-Vice-Chancellor/Dean of the College, the relevant Associate Dean for Research, the Director of Research Services and the Director of Impact, Innovation and Business.
Typically, the main areas of assessment for the Research Monitoring (RM) meetings were:
- Overall strategy and research environment for the UoA – strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, aspirations. This included performance at UoA level on research activity (including income generation) and postgraduate research students (numbers and completion rates) benchmarked against the selected competitor group medians per FTE.
- Published research outputs focusing on internal or external reviews, particularly on those likely to be submitted in the REF.
- Impact-related activity including potential UoA impact case studies – progress, planned activity, resources required.
As we approached the submission date of the Research Excellence Framework (REF) cycle, the focus of the REF meetings was increasingly focused on preparations for the REF submission, using where feasible REF templates for the completion of information.
The scheduling of the 2019 Research Monitoring (RM19) and 2020 Research Monitoring (RM20) meetings were closely linked to Exeter's preparation for the REF2021 submission.
From 2021/22, the nature of these meetings will be changed, while a new name is being finalised for these meetings, a set of departmental annual review meetings have been scheduled for June and July 2022.