Rethinking Academic Value: Experiments in Research Assessment with the ‘Evaluative Inquiry’ Approach

• In Event: E/valuative Actions: Exploring the Doings of E/valuation in Evaluative Systems 2

Abstract

Recent years have shown a diversification of the criteria used for steering and assessing academic research, e.g. by including requirements to evaluate the societal relevance of research. In Europe, prominent examples include EU framework programs for research and innovation focusing on challenge-based approaches, and the role of societal impact assessment in the UK Research Excellence Framework. Both steering mechanisms are explicitly framed in terms of the role of science in and for society. In the Netherlands, the launch of a new Standard Evaluation Protocol (SEP) in 2014 reflects a similar trend. In addition to academic performance, societal relevance is now explicitly part of the protocol. This triggers new developments in assessing research, some of which have already been included in assessment procedures, whilst others are to be included in future practices.
The evaluative inquiry approach can be used to design and streamline current and future assessments, shifting from reactive to pro-active behavior, and from accountability to learning orientation, towards a dialogic mode between evaluators and evaluatees. This paper addresses two actual assessments in the Netherlands, in psychology and theology, in which this approach was tried out. The approach situates academic performance within a wider variety of activities, interactions, outputs and audiences. This orientation allows for a rethinking of what and where academic value is. Steering away from describing academia by counting values, the evaluative inquiry is a tactics that follows value pathways, allowing us to ask questions about which worlds these pathways bring about and hold in tension.

Authors

• Thed van Leeuwen, Leiden University

• Tjitske Holtrop

• Sarah de Rijcke, Centre for Science and Technology Studies (CWTS)