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Research impact’s ‘uneven playing field’ hits small universities

Disparities in impact-related support for UK academics may widen funding inequalities from Research Excellence Framework, scholars fear

July 1, 2025
Jack Grove
Runners & horses compete in the Man V Horse marathon, Wales. To illustrate differences in resources available to staff to demonstrate impact in the REF have raised concerns over an “unlevel playing field” that may disadvantage smaller universities
Source: Graham M. Lawrence/Alamy

Massive differences in resources available to staff seeking to demonstrate impact in the UK’s Research Excellence Framework (REF) have raised concerns over an “unlevel playing field” that may disadvantage smaller universities.

In the next REF, research impact (now defined as “engagement and impact”) will once again account for 25 per cent of an institution’s overall score, with universities required to submit at least one impact case study per unit of assessment. A total of 6,781 impact case studies were?to the 2021 exercise, which has been used to distribute about ?2 billion annually in quality-related block funding to universities.

Units will also need to submit an “explanatory statement” worth at least 20 per cent of impact in the REF 2029. That statement will set out the “wider contribution [of] research activities to society and the economy” with reference to certain metrics and indicators, according to initial decisions?.

However, a new??by Polish researchers has raised questions about whether academics in smaller universities will struggle to compete for impact-related funds given the relatively low level of support compared?with the more comprehensive impact infrastructure available in larger universities.

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Drawing on Freedom of Information requests to UK universities, the study, due to be presented at the??taking place at UCL from 30 June to 2 July, found 85 per cent of all research institutions had dedicated impact personnel, which rose to almost 100 per cent for universities with more than 20,000 students. Only 60 per cent of universities with fewer than 10,000 students had any dedicated impact staff.

But the scale of resource available at larger universities was particularly striking: smaller universities with fewer than 20,000 students tended to have only one permanent impact officer (the most frequent answer and given by 37 per cent of respondents) while institutions with more than 20,000 students tended to have five or more impact officers (the most frequent answer at 42 per cent).

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In similar fashion, larger institutions are much more likely to use short-term staff to support submissions, with 43 per cent of large institutions admitting doing this compared?with?only 14 per cent of smaller institutions.

“Perhaps smaller institutions make up for the lack of staff on contracts by outsourcing part of the work – the percentage of small institutions using external consultants to support REF preparation is slightly higher (59 per cent) than at large institutions (50 per cent),” the report’s co-author Marta?Wróblewska, from Warsaw’s SWPS University, told?探花视频.

However, “overall, larger institutions have more varied and more targeted impact services, while at smaller universities it is often one or two people doing all the work – including training and support for impact case studies,” continued Wróblewska, who said early analysis of separate “qualitative data suggests there is some frustration with how things are done at smaller institutions where the impact staff?are overburdened.”

In free text comments, some respondents suggested the imbalance in impact-related resources meant impact in the REF is now an “unlevel playing field”, explained Wróblewska, who is the principal investigator on two projects studying impact policies internationally.

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The survey results may reinforce?longstanding concerns?that elements of the REF, including research environment scores, now weighted at 25 per cent, tend to help larger universities who find it easier to cite metrics on doctoral completions, research grant funding and infrastructure spend.

Given these concerns the broader impact statement may be useful for smaller universities, despite the added bureaucracy, because it is a “space to showcase potential for impact and ongoing efforts and investment in this area,” said?Wróblewska.

“Small institutions can use this space to highlight their strengths in the area of impact which may not always translate into flashy impact case studies, but are still worth recognising,” she said, adding that “sometimes the added context can explain why the declared impact is not so impressive, such as the discipline being recently established or the failure of a potential impact case due to political changes”.

Despite concern over different resources for impact evaluation within UK universities, they still compared favourably?with other countries where this measure is assessed, added?Wróblewska.

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“This is a resource that might be taken for granted in the British system, but it has only emerged over the last decade and one that we are very envious of in the Polish and Ukrainian systems which have impact evaluations modelled on the REF but without adequate institutional support,” she said.

jack.grove@timeshighereducation.com

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Reader's comments (5)

#1 Submitted by graff.... on July 1, 2025 - 12:55am
This is the rational fallacy underscored.
#2 Submitted by ... on July 1, 2025 - 9:13am
Yes but everyone knew this. Impact was designed to benefit certain kinds of research. When introduced HEFCE pilot the schemes in such a way that mitigated to the impact on certain Universities and certain subjects so that the profession as a whole would accept the agenda. Once the agenda is accepted and institutionalised then its true logic begins to play out and all the assurances simply evaporate. We were assured when the original RSA/RAE/REF methodologies were worked out that this was purely an assessment exercise and would not alter or impact on the research we did, merely the "putting of a 'lens' " over our research not in anyway affecting the kids of research we undertook. When it suited them, this was abandoned, Impact, Open Access publication etc etc are were deployed to change and direct the kinds of research we undertook and the ways in which it was disseminated. I am afraid, in my opinion, that the whole business of research assessment (which in principle I approve of) has been a matter of bad faith, more or less throughout the totality of its operation (and I include the ways in which academics have incorporated themselves within its processes largely for their own career and personal benefit.
#3 Submitted by ... on July 1, 2025 - 9:32am
The Impact aspect of REF really has become the most onerous and expensive element of the exercise for many. It's odd that HEFCE as it then was, was always telling us how desperate it was to reduce cost, but then bolted on this highly problematic aspect to it, largely at the whim of (if I may so describe it) one Chief Executive and forced through more or less without criticism. Universities clambered over themselves to make the agenda work for their own interests and never really questioned the premises. This unquestioning (often sycophantic) compliance is pretty standard for all senior managements from VC/PVC/Councils/Senates as we see from the Dundee and other scandals. Now of course impact becomes normalised and institutionalised as an agenda despite the damage that it does. The argument for it, from the chap who developed it, however was always utilitarian, perhaps cynical, in that at least it would provide some data with which to argue with government for a good funding allocation. There was never anything intrinsic to the strategy that was seen to be important. On its own terms this is fair enough if it does the job without too much harm, but now it has been re-ified into something approaching a Platonic idea concerning what real or true research should be, despite, I think, the general sense in the profession and the larger intellectual world this is not what they think of as research. It's a bit to ;ate to complain about this "unintended" consequences of the system as, to be honest. most of them are really intended consequences now revealing themselves. I am in favour of research assessment in terms of public accountability and concerns, but I don't think the system we have where every few years some new fad is bolted on, or the existing procedure dramatically tweaked really helps anyone. It's also a factor in the current bleeding dry of Universities by addition, meta level of expensive administration which is parasitic (not symbiotic) on the research process. Could, for example, the system be slimmed down, made less onerous and expensive and the resource channelled in to the funding councils to facilitate research?
#4 Submitted by ... on July 1, 2025 - 9:58am
We are told there is a financial crisis in the sector, reflected by the absolutely dreadful state of the current public finances nationally (and the situation really is bad), yet this bloated and ludicrously wasteful excercise just waddles on year after year getting fatter and fatter sucking up our depleted revenues. Surely it is possible to devise an assessment system which does the job and costs much less? How on earth can we complain about under funding when we are so profligate with what we have. Costs saved could, for example, be hypothecated to increase the deficit in FEC research overheads our VCs complain about? It won't happen because so many of our colleagues and managers have so much invested in the system as it is it defines who they are and how their careers will swiftly and smoothly progress and the rewards they will obtain, so there is no incentive to reform the system and make it more efficient and cost effective.
new
#5 Submitted by ... on July 1, 2025 - 10:57am
I always groan and roll my eyes when my colleagues (often from Business etc) promote the merits of "creative destruction" as a means to reform what we do. But it does seem to me that this would be a good policy in looking at REF assessment. Nothing off the table, roots and branch reform, with a view to slimming down the exercise and saving time and resource for better things. It's odd that these who champion the principle don't apply it here. It does seem long overdue given the sate of the current finances of the sector and might make some difference and do some good? I imagine that govt would also be sympathetic to it. I agree with what people say about the continual "bolting on" and endless tweaking of the system we have. It's not doing anyone any good in my view. So don;t abolish research assessment but do it a different and more rational way? I do think the Impact methodology would not stand up to too much scrutiny from an objective observer, but others may disagree.

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