Dr Jessica Day, Research Excellence Team
In every way, universities, their staff and students, are having to adapt to the changing environment that today’s current situation has imposed; they, in a fashion not wholly new to the academics, professional staff, and students incorporated in the matrix of university life and research, are enforced to take on and enact the persona of the chameleon. The great power of the chameleon species – a breed of lizard recognised for its adaptability as well as its diverse multiplicity – is found in its ability to move with and change alongside the environment it finds itself in. And today, more than ever, in these ever more disruptive times of unprecedented change, it is the powers of the chameleon we are being demanded to evoke.
Research impact, defined simply as ‘the effect or change research generates beyond academia’ and an increasingly important part of the multidimensional arrangements of academic practice, is also being faced with the challenge of change. On 24th March 2020, Research England announced that the 2021 Research Excellence Framework (REF) – a process of expert review intended to assess and measure the impact of academic research – would be placed on hold ‘until further notice.’ More recently, over the last few weeks Research England have been in consultation with institutions with regard to how its new format might be composed; there is debate around such matters as to whether the assessment period of impact should be moved from its original end-date of the 31st July 2020 to 31st December 2020, how to best include a process of assessment for mitigating circumstances, and, the re-organisation of the overall submission timetable. Equally, the postponement or cancellation of academic events, publications, and research activity alongside the demands of trying to work and teach online from home in a pandemic, have put a strain on the generation and possibility of research impact.
Much like the academics we work to support, here in the Research Excellence Team (RET) at the University of Kent we, too, are feeling the ripple effect of these changes and recognise that even as and if the regulations around Covid-19 relax, we will all be working in ways anew and down paths possibly still unknown. Yet, in supporting research impact across the university and coordinating the preparations for the REF, we have already gained insightful knowledge of some of the ingenious ways our academics’ research proliferates into impactful change and benefits for society, its economy and culture. Such ingenuity we, those of us in RET , are ready to continue to support and discover new ways of working with in a plight to continue the impact Kent’s academics engender and accomplish. Myself, as one of the university’s impact officer, along with my colleague, Ann Kinzer, working in the same role, are both ready to embrace our inner chameleon with you, as are the rest of the staff in RET that we work with, so as to celebrate and extend the capacity of your research impact. Ann is currently in the process of compiling advice for how we can support you in the organisation of online events, production of podcasts, or, working with KMTV (whom our team have strong relationships with) – and, we’re always here as your impact support system and advocates should you need us.
Jessica Day
Disclaimer: no chameleons were hurt in the formulation of this article.
Photo Credit: By Benny Trapp – Own work, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=12631288