Healthcare and Science thomsonreuters.com

“Justify budget of €2bn, colleges warned” – Irish Independent, August 14, 2008

“There is definitely increased pressure on budgets,” says Niamh Brennan, Programme Manager for Trinity College Dublin. “It’s intense. The Government, the funding agencies, the media all want to see results and the value we are getting from research spend.” Brennan works on the National Research Data Project for Ireland, a three year project involving seven universities that aims to develop a deep infrastructure for research evaluation. “With the talk all about making cuts, we need to clearly show how the funds we are granted have been effective in significantly increasing the impact of Irish research.”

The New Way – Jonathan Adams, Director of Research Evaluation for Thomson Reuters sees core data being used in new ways to help research organizations demonstrate a return on investment. “Everyone is expecting cuts,” he said. “We can now supply new services and analytical reports to help these organizations to come out on top when times get good again.” Even in the downturn there are success stories for those who are prepared to show evidence of value.

Bucking the Trend – The University of Leeds is expanding its research program despite the downturn. Professor Peter Buckley, Director of the Centre for International Business at Leeds attributed the success to a concentration on areas of “outstanding research capability” and moving researchers to publish in high-impact journals. “We recently broke into the top 1% for citations in the field of Economics and Business,” he said. “Achieving consistent high grades in research-assessment exercises means we have been able secure the funding to expand research capacity of the School.”