MINUTE of the SCHOOL RESEARCH COMMITTEE
held in Room 302, 3 University Gardens, 27 May 2014
PRESENT:
.
T Clancy (Chair), S Driscoll, S Newman, I Ruffell, A. Shepard
Action:
1.
Apologies
I.Anderson, F Macpherson, P.O’Brien, A Weir.
2.
Minutes of the meeting held 12 February 2014
Clarification on item 6 -should
have stated that in 2012/13 the School had
£66,000 Incentivisition funds of which only £48,000 had been spent.
2013/14 has £87,000.
3.
The minutes were approved.
Matters Arising
Leverhulme Early Career Fellowship
Unfortunately the application submitted and supported by the School had been
unsuccessful. 800 applications overall had been submitted to Leverhulme and
the College were now considering revising policy on number of applications
allowed to be submitted as clearly other Universities were not following this
system. Update on Policy when available.
SoH KE Officer
TC reported School of Critical Studies had created this post and School of
Modern Languages had a similar post in Billy Grove. Committee asked if they
felt this was the way forward. Clarification needed on posts responsibility and
role. Recommend appointment to School Management.
Research
Convenor
TC
TC
4.
REF Feedback
TC required REF Champions to submit their prose on their reflection of the
processes. TC to produce a report for HoS. REF provisional results would be
available 16/17 December for sense checking before being made public on the
18th.
Convenor’s Business
AHRC CDA Competition: deadline 18 June
Internal deadline of 18th June – AHRC deadline 9th July. SD to talk with Karen
Lury re the Heritage Strand.
Carnegie Small Grants
Now changed to Carnegie Research Incentive Grants. Aimed at Early Career
Researchers/supporting start up costs for projects. Maximum had been
increased from 2.5K to 7.5K. Peer Review process for this scheme had also
changed with current SoH staff participating (ROM/TC/SN), good to have
Humanities input.
This change has implications to PDR process as universal grant capture for staff
no longer available – SN reported that B.A. were also considering adopting the
Carnegie Policy. Committee asked to ensure colleagues were aware of the
change.
PhDs applying to AHRC & Carnegie for funding there was now a three month
time difference in the announcement of results.
Leverhulme Studentships: Theme ‘Collections’
Leverhulme now offering block grants for studentships Karen Lury leading a
team on a ‘Collections’ bid. This had only recently been given the green light.
SN suggested that KL circulate to all in College.
SD
ALL
EW had
emailed info
to all R&T
staff on
23/4/14
SRA Competition results.
The School had experienced relative success. Critical Studies £1,250;
Humanities £1,600; SML £3,000
Feedback on the amount given to SML – No overhead income to call upon;
strong steer from SML re what should be funded, not leaving it to College to
decide. SML praised for their approach. Committee agreed that this was a lot of
power to have in one persons domain. SD felt this was homogeneous, would be
more difficult to balance within Humanities in comparison to English. Humanities
would need a clearer system for ranking; proportional distribution; quality of
proposals; filter system. TC to ask ROM what he thinks the College may adapt
as a policy as it seemed a lot of work for the amounts of money being awarded.
Open Access
TC asked Committee to ensure that all colleagues were aware that it is now
policy that the Library must be notified at acceptance stage for all Journals.
Research Leave Changes
Main issues – strengthen the role of Schools. Case being aligned with strategic
areas – back to Subject Heads providing the statement, School to make sure
research leave available.
Longer lead in time for school applicants – heads of subject. AHRC potential
buy outs; body off most years; no one is entitled to research leave, not enough
bodies or resources. Consequences should be thought through and Subject
area should have a plan. Leave should be focused.
TC had been surprised as his understanding was that need for applications for
externally funded income was going to be lightened not strengthened. SN
explained that some types of research leave did not always require funding but
did need the time - grant income received a year ago, now need the leave to
write the book – Scottish Historians often have the research facilities on their
doorstep, no need for travel – endowments funding travel. Making people apply
for external funding before research leave approved in certain cases was an
unnecessary time consuming exercise.
REACH – TC asked Committee to make sure colleagues were aware of REACH
http://www.gla.ac.uk/colleges/arts/knowledge-exchange/newsletter/reach04/
and encourage them to pass on to Fraser Rowan any information on
projects that staff & students are undertaking with external partners.
5.
Incentivisation
This item was on the Agenda for the School Management Meeting (28/5/14).
Substantially it was the same policy being proposed. The 6 main grant holders
had been circulated and their comment as PI requested. Currently there was a
mixed economy of spend – current or future projects – sub areas –
M.Litt/PhD/Centres. Committee felt that current scheme of incentivisation
worked. PI needs flexibility – timescale & what they can use the money for –
restriction of spend, i.e. equipment as some Research Councils do not fund
these items.
Suggestions:Meetings re how budgeting works with PIs/Head of Subjects.
Being able to carry over funds - restraint of the financial year. 50% research
income – equitable process of distribution - £350 per head
4 new members of staff were surprised that they were not given an individual
research budget as is the policy in most other Universities. Suggestion of
looking at the scientist model.
Process of gaining a small amount of money too time consuming
IR – benefit to UoA – through Catherine Steel’s grant the subject area had been
able to produce a 5 year plan. Incentivisation to go for big grants is the strategic
benefit to a UoA day to day basis, free up research time which otherwise would
be used for tutorials etc.
Salary recoup as an incentivisation – CCA/CS already have something similar in
ALL
place.
Morale issue – getting something is better than getting nothing. Perhaps a trial
run for 2 years.
Centres relied on PIs using incentivisation for strategic instead of individual
initiative. Give power to make decisions there and then instead of applications.
Stream of money going into Centres would be reduced.
6.
A.O.C.B
There was no other business.
As this was TC last Research Committee meeting as Convenor, he thanked all
for their work, especially over REF
7.
Date of Next Meeting