This report identifies the challenges particularly relevant for the SSH, such as different
and thus often conflicting research paradigms or epistemological styles of reviewers
and applicants or authors; difficulty in many SSH disciplines to define and evaluate research
methodology compared to STEM disciplines; the lack of the idea of linear progress
and a much longer time span necessary to evaluate academic impact of publications; the
diversity of publication outputs and specific importance of books or monographs; the importance
of local languages; challenges related to recent developments in research and its
evaluation related to growing interdisciplinarity and Open Science turn. To this, the general
challenges of peer review are added, such as the risk of gender bias, conservative bias,
work load for all parties involved.
The development of research evaluation protocols and performance-based funding systems is rooted in policy decisions aiming to improve research and the research system as a whole. However, the implementation of such policies has attracted a great deal of criticism, especially from the SSH.
The purpose of the RESSH conference (September 17-18, 2020) is to explore whether evaluation can be useful to SSH researchers, whether it seeks to improve the quality and relevance of research or whether it is simply a management tool for the allocation of funds or imposition of policy.
More information can be found on the conference website.
ENRESSH organizes a dissemination meeting in Paris on February 18. Our stakeholders are very welcome to join us and to learn about our results! The agenda can be found below and downloaded here. If you would like to attend the meeting, please register here.
Dissemination meeting
Paris, 18 of February 2020
If you would like to attend the ENRESSH Meeting in Paris, please register via the registration form by 10 February 2020.
Participation in the meeting is free of charge.
Venue:
Université Sorbonne Nouvelle
Institut du Monde anglophone
5, rue de l’École de Médecine
75006 PARIS
AGENDA
18th of February, 2020
Dissemination Event
10h00–10h30 Opening of the event by Mrs. Monica DIETL, former director of COST and Mr. Jamil Jean-Marc DAKHLIA, president of the Université Sorbonne-Nouvelle
10h30–10h45 Research evaluation for the benefit of society (Emanuel Kulczycki)
10h45–12h45 ENRESSH toolbox for SSH policy community
Chair: Jack Spaapen
Evaluation as a tool to achieve policies
- Michael Ochsner: Aligning research evaluation with clear policy goals: risks and opportunities
- Paul Benneworth: How to provide structures and incentives to foster impactful research
Improving research information systems
- Linda Sīle: National bibliographic databases for research evaluation: the knowns and the unknowns
- Elea Gimenez-Toledo and Gunnar Sivertsen: ABP, the register of Academic Book Publishers
Internationality and locality: Opposition or a winning team?
- Janne Pölönen: The Helsinki Initiative on Multilingualism in Scholarly Communication
- Jon Holm: Peer Review, language, national and international communities
12h45–14h00 Lunch
14:00–16:00 ENRESSH tips for SSH research community
Chair: Emanuel Kulczycki
Evaluation and publication strategy
- Tim Engels & Emanuel Kulczycki: Diversity of publication patterns and its implications for evaluation
- Marc Vanholsbeeck: How to promote open science
- Julia Olmos Peñuela: Managing the tensions of rigour and relevance in output evaluation
Evaluation and career
- Ginevra Peruginelli: Diversity of evaluation systems
- Marc Vanholsbeeck: Early career investigators and evaluation in SSH: Opportunities and threats
Role as evaluators
- Michael Ochsner: Identifying research quality
- Raf Guns & Marek Hołowiecki: Ambiguity, labelling and questionable practices in peer review
In this manual of good practices for the maintenance of national bibliographic databases for research output, Linda Sīle, Raf Guns, Dragan Ivanović and Janne Pölönen outline several aspects that they regard as especially important for databases that are used for evaluation and funding allocation purposes.
ENRESSH published a video with testimonials of the participants of the Trainingschool ‘Evaluation procedures and their impact on SSH careers.’ The school was organised at Vilnius University in Lithuania from 7-11 January 2019. The materials of the training school can be found here.
Reviewers should rate the objects of evaluation across a broad range of criteria rather than giving a holistic judgement. Also, the criteria should clearly differentiate between criteria for scientific quality and criteria concerning policy goals or relation to or impact on society. Furthermore, reviewing should be part of academic education. This is what Work Group 1 concludes in a report on peer review practices in the SSH.
The deadline for STSM applications under call 4.2 has been extended until August 25. More information on this call and STSMs in general can be found here.
Researchers in sub-Saharan Africa tend to conceptualize impact as a result. They understand impact as ‘ ‘a (generally) positive effect that contributes to change in the daily life of human kind.’ Impact of the social sciences and humanities is the least recognized as such, also by researchers from the social sciences and humanities. Taking into account these perspectives on impact is important for African and European funders when designing calls and evaluating projects. European researchers need to be aware of and respect these perspectives when collaborating with researchers from sub-Saharan Africa.
The full paper is advance access available (login required): Nelius Boshoff & Stefan de Jong (advance access). ‘Conceptualizing the societal impact of research in terms of elements of logic models: a survey of researchers in sub-Saharan Africa. ‘ In: Research Evaluation.
In compliance with the General Data Protection Regulation by the EU, on this page we explain what data we collect as well as how we store and use it.
The explanation consists of the following topics:
Data controller
Who is concerned by this privacy policy
What information about you do we handle, why do we handle that information, what is the legal basis for those processings and for how long do we retain the information?
Use of service providers and transfer to third parties
How do we protect your personal data?
How long is the information retained for?
Your rights
Data controller
Your personal data are processed stored on the servers of OVH.com on behalf of Adam Mickiewicz University of Poznan. If you have any queries about the process or how we handle your information please contact us at:
Address: Wieniawskiego 1, 61-712 Poznań, Poland
Email: holomark[@]amu.edu.pl
Who is concerned by this privacy policy
Every COST Action participant and visitor of our website, people who use our services, e.g. who subscribe to our newsletter, as well as people who email us or chat with us.
What information about you do we handle, why do we handle that information, what is the legal basis for those processings and for how long do we retain the information?
On top of the personal data collected and processed by the COST Association in the framework of this COST Action, for which you can consult the privacy notice for e-COST,
Based on your consent (article 6.1.a) of the GDPR), we :
- publish your contact details on the COST Action ENRESSH website and other communications tools or publications for communication purposes;
- take and use pictures/videos where you appear taken or made during a meeting / an event of or related to the COST Action ENRESSH on the COST Action ENRESSH website and other communications tools or publications for communication purposes.
You have the right to withdraw your consent at any time by sending an email to s.p.l.de.jong[@]luris.nl (the Science Communication manager). Withdrawing your consent means that the collected personal data will not be used any longer. However, use made of your data in the past remains valid.
When you register for newsletters :
Based on your consent (article 6.1.a) of the GDPR):
- We collect and process your identification data (name, first name, title and email address) for registration and delivering of our newsletters. We use a service provider to deliver our newsletters.
You may unsubscribe from our newsletters at any time. We will not keep your data once you have unsubscribed.
Based on our legitimate interests or those of the COST Association (article 6.1.f of the GDPR).
- When you register for newsletters, we gather statistics around email opening and clicks using industry standard technologies including clear gifs. This information is only processed in a way which does not identify anyone. We do not make any attempt to find out the identities of those visiting our website.
When you email us, chat with us or otherwise contact us:
We process your contact details, when required, in order to provide you with the requested support. This data processing is based on your consent (article 6.1.a of the GDPR).
Based on your consent (article 6.1.a) of the GDPR):
When you register for events, we collect your identification data (name, first name, title, email address, and phone numbers) and professional data (position and institution).
When you register for events, we also ask you
- whether you have special dietary requirements or other specific needs. Those data are collected for the organisation of the event.
We do not keep your dietary requirements or other mentioned specific needs for longer than the event.
- whether you are in agreement with us:
- including your contact details in the list of participants to the event that is made available on the COST Action website / to all participants for networking purposes;
- taking and using pictures during the event for promotional and information purposes.
Not providing your consent for taking pictures is without impact on your participation to events, workshops or webinars.
The data we collect are kept as long as you do not oppose to it.
When you contact us to make use of your data subject rights:
We process your contact details and the proof of your identity you send us in order to address your request. We can also depending on your request process other personal data we have collected also in order to address your request.
This data processing is for compliance with legal obligations to which we are subject (article 6.1.c of the GDPR).
Use of service providers and transfer to third parties
We do have recourse to service providers to deliver our newsletters.
Those service providers otherwise referred to as data processors are third parties who provide elements of support to us. We have contracts in place with our data processors. They cannot do anything with your personal information unless we have instructed them to do it. They will not share your personal information with any organisation apart from us. They will hold it securely and retain it for the period we instruct.
We do not transfer any of your data collected as mentioned above to any third party for commercial purposes.
How do we protect your personal data?
Your personal data are handled in full confidentiality. We make all necessary effort to take technical and organisational measures that might be required so as to ensure security of your personal data.
How long is the information retained for?
To be defined by (institution who maintains the website) for data processing which do not mention it already.
If we speak of emails and newsletters, it should be no longer than required to answer the demand.
Action website and its content is maintained for a minimum 2 years after the end of the Action and will expire on July 11 2022.
Your rights
Under the General Data Protection Regulation (Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Directive 95/46/EC (GDPR), you have rights as an individual which you can exercise in relation to the information we hold about you:
- right to request from us access to and rectification of your personal data;
- right to request erasure of your data (right to be forgotten) in the cases foreseen by article 17 of the GDPR ;
- right to obtain from us restriction of processing where there is contestation about the data processing for a period enabling to solve the issue;
- right to data portability;
- where the processing of your personal data is based on your consent, you have the right to withdraw your consent at any time. Withdrawing your consent means that we will not make use of your data any longer, including pictures. However, use made of your data in the past remains valid.
Your right to object
You have the right to object, on grounds relating to your particular situation, at any time to processing of your personal data which is based on Article 6(1), (f) of the GDPR (our legitimate purposes) as mentioned above.
To exercise those rights, please send us an email to s.p.l.de.jong[@]luris.nl together with a proof of your identity or write us to the following address:
Luris
T.A.V. Stefan de Jong
Langegracht 70 (PLNT Leiden)
2312 NV Leiden
The Netherlands
Please note that you always have the right to lodge a complaint with the Supervisory authority of the EU country of your choice.
‘Senior academics are key negotiaters in the implementation of impact policies’ says a team of ENRESSH members headed by Marc Vanholsbeeck in their new paper published by the Journal for Science and Technology Policy Evaluation (Open Access). The paper is available for download here.