Leading departments face cuts under ‘unnoticed’ REF funding shift

All very interesting with some big changes in income for individual institutions. However, this only covers a small part of overall University funding. The most important figure for each institution is the Total amount of tax payer funding provided, given the extent of cross subsidies between the different pots of money available. Perhaps, at a national level, we need a better way of deciding which sectors and which institutions receive funds? Are the current criteria used to allocate funding appropriate? Should we not try harder to ensure we get a more efficient and effective model that delivers a better return on investment? Are we even using RoI (Return on Investment) as a measure of success? Universities are not the only institutions getting Government funding for Research.

Economists are their own worst enemies. They diss each others research and make getting a 4 in the REF very hard. No wonder the number of economics departments submitting in the REF has fallen. Meanwhile in other subjects getting a 4 is very easy, such as management and sociology hence these subjects get increased funding while doing fairly low level research compared to the economists. The Economics panel is easily the harshest and worst at appraising research in the REF.