[Academic] FW: Engagement and Impact case studies for REF - 2025 research quality review

[Catherine Cheshire]

Message sent on behalf of Alan Kemp

Dear All,

As part of the University's 2025 Research Quality Review, the department is being asked to update its list of potential Engagement and Impact case studies for REF2029.


  *   If you have already spoken to me about a potential case study, there is no need to do anything right now (I'll be in contact directly in due course to discuss the current status).


  *   If you haven't spoken to me about a potential case study but are aware of an area that might support a study, please do get in contact (alan.kemp at strath.ac.uk<mailto:alan.kemp at strath.ac.uk>).

For REF2029, the impact and engagement (definitions below) needs to occur between 1st Jan 2021 and 31st Dec 2028.

Please do get in touch if there is the potential for impact before the end of 2028 - even if it hasn't arisen yet. Since we have an Engagement and Impact narrative to prepare in addition to the case studies, it will be very useful for REF2029 to have an overview of all the areas within the department that could conceivably support a case study even if we will only be able to submit four in the end.

Suggestions are very welcome from all members of the department.

Very many thanks in advance for your time.

Best regards,
Alan



Definition of impact and engagement for REF2029 case studies:

  *   Impact is some form of societal or economic benefit that can be linked back to Strathclyde research. This could be sales or jobs created or costs saved, but could also be a policy influenced, a harm reduced, a medical or health benefit, an improvement in quality of life, an environmental good, public engagement (beyond the HE sector), or influence of teaching (beyond Strathclyde). Anything that reaches beyond academia is worth discussing to see if it fits the REF definitions (they are wide ranging).
  *   Although economic impacts (e.g. sales/spin-outs/jobs) are often seen as the easiest to evidence, the very best case studies will usually encompass a range of impact and engagement types. No one type of impact or engagement is seen as intrinsically better than another.
  *   Engagement (including public engagement) is an element of impact (provided it is engagement beyond academia).
  *   Although we need to be able to link the impact back to Strathclyde research, we don't necessarily need to be involved with generating the impact - if someone picks up on your work independently of you and uses it to the benefit of society or the economy, then that impact can still count for REF (if we can evidence it).
  *   For the avoidance of doubt, academic impact is assessed in the other two pillars of the REF process and so isn't included in the 'engagement and impact' pillar.



-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://phys.strath.ac.uk/pipermail/academic/attachments/20250304/7fe89556/attachment-0001.htm>