A quarterly publication of AQU Catalunya

97

April 2020

AQU Catalunya's Research Assessment Committee (CAR) is responsible for the assessment and granting of accreditation for various categories of university teaching staff, as well as the recognition of merits in research. The Agency annually publishes the criteria for the various different assessment and accreditation procedures. All of this, together with the framework of well-defined review procedures, serves as the context for the work of the members of the Research Assessment Committee's various specific committees.

With regard to the committee that deals specifically with Life Sciences, each application is assessed by two people from the same or a closely related subject area. This is followed by a consensual face-to-face assessment of each application by the Research Assessment Committee, taking into account the two aforementioned assessments. I would here underline that the reviewers' opinions regarding assessment are given totally independently, the criteria are responsibly and rigorously applied, with both the applicant's background and the finer details stemming from the actual assessment being taken into account. These same values govern the meetings of the Research Assessment Committee that, during the time I have been a member, has made all of its decisions on the basis of consensus, which at times has led to very intense in-depth discussions.

Another assignment of the CAR's various specific committees is to deliberate on the assessment criteria. There is now a fairly broad worldwide consensus on the key indicators for assessing research in the field of Life Sciences. The Research Assessment Committee has always taken this into account, together with the changing circumstances of research, along with the standards and the realities of each subject area with the field of knowledge, in order to better qualify the indicators and their application. For example, discussions on the quality of merits and how this how might compensate for the lack or shortcoming of a certain specific merit were highly relevant.

The Research Assessment Committee was already applying this criterion on a regular basis, but what was necessary was for it to be made explicit. One final comment regarding the assessment procedure, it should be pointed out that there is an open discussion in the world of science on the need to improve and enhance the ways in which the findings and outcomes of research are evaluated and assessed. AQU Catalunya's Governing Board recently became party to DORA (Declaration on Research Assessment), whereby it supports this initiative and took an initial step in this regard.

The actual process of reviewing and assessing teaching staff in higher education is intended to ensure that candidates to posts in HE institutions have proven experience of quality in research, in accordance with the standards of their fields of knowledge. I would also like to express here my support for the assessment of teaching in the whole procedure. There are various reasons for this, but the most important for me is the urgent need for the acknowledgement of teaching in higher education. This can only happen if teaching and research both receive the same level of attention. It is important to bear in mind that universities need good teacher-researchers or, what amounts to the same thing, researcher-teachers, as it is they who are ultimately responsible for educating and training the professionals who go on to enter industry and enterprise, the teachers in the educational system and the researchers in the universities themselves and research institutes. This is all something that serious thought needs to be given to.