GENDER AND THE RESEARCH ASSESSMENT EXERCISE

1. GENDER AND THE RESEARCH ASSESSMENT EXERCISE Dr Ruth Adams, CMCI Dr Kate Maclean, Geography

2. Gender and the REF • How is the REF gendered? The numbers • Why might this be? • What have feminist researchers had to say about this? • What can be done?

3. HEFCE Report: Selection of staff for inclusion in RAE 2008 HEFCE 2009:12

4. HEFCE Report: Selection of staff for inclusion in RAE2008 Bibliometric evidence in the 2006 report indicated that the lower selection rate of women in the 30-50 age range may be due to a lower proportion of women having a research record that leads them to be selected, rather than bias in the selection process. While differences in selection rate between men and women may be linked to selection bias resulting from age and gender, it could equally be a result of deeply rooted inequalities in the research careers of men and women. (HEFCE 2009: 3)

5. Structural biases • Maternity leave “the position of staff who have taken maternity leave or career breaks or been absent through illness will be taken into consideration, although it is up to university managements to draw this to the panel’s attention.” (Knights and Richards 2003: 220) • “One pregnancy; one publication”

6. “differences between the sexes were most apparent for scholars aged between 45 and 50”(THES 17/9/9) “every birth and every death should count as at least the equivalent of  one international journal article, if not a whole series!” WGSG online discussion

7. Gendered values https://www.kcl.ac.uk/kingsanswers/media/index.aspx

8. The world knows the answers to some questions already: • Can we build a bomb that destroys cities? • Do women really have equal rights worldwide? • Do we honestly need another series of the X factor?

9. What are feminist researchers saying about this? • Bev Skeggs “Bizarrely those who implement these measures have conceptual knowledge of Weber and all the critiques of Western imperial knowledge. It’s almost surreal as banal positivist masculinity attempts to measure feminist performance.” (Skeggs 2008) • Linda McDowell and the geography REF panel

10. Still a masculine noun • The increased concentration of funding in an ever-smaller number of elite universities is likely to further benefit men, as these institutions tend to have an even lower proportion of senior female academics than the rest of the sector. Assumptions of a level playing field in research assessment ignore not only the gendered economy of "care" in the academy, but also the material and cultural conditions that affect academic productivity and success, such as opportunities for study leave, sabbaticals and reduced teaching loads. And to cap it all, recent research from Sweden has found that male researchers are far more likely to be deemed "excellent" than females. We still have a long way to go. Carole Leathwood, THE 20/10/11

11. And critical social theorists? And the lesson today is how to die His escape into the ivory tower of the University of Wannabee Academic (UWA) had put fire in his belly for a while as, armed with an embryonic understanding of critical theory, he played the role of a radical academic. It all sounded so good, so exciting, so certain. Of course, it wasn’t, the only certainty being that not much really changed. The rules of the game remained the same, only gradually the policing of scholarship became more open, more evident, more in-your-face. The mantra: ‘Research grants in – Publications out’ began to colonize the terrain. More waves of disillusionment engulfed him. At times he almost drowned. Sparkes 2007: 253-4

12. Equality and Diversity Women’s Network Supporting and enabling the progression of women working at King's Since 2003, equality and diversity staff in the Governance Team have facilitated a series of Action Learning Sets and workshops for women at the College.

13. ECU response to equality considerations in the Research Excellence Framework ECU responded to this consultation from our perspective as an organisation concerned with advancing equality for individuals in higher education. ECU recognises that the UK funding councils have worked hard to ensure that equalities are embedded into the REF and welcomes the inclusion of equalities in the environment template. However, the tariffs for clearly defined and more complex staff circumstances will mean that few staff are entitled to a reduction in output for equality related reasons. Consequently, the equality measure within the REF may have limited impact in addressing the inequalities that exist within research careers and the higher education sector more generally. http://www.ecu.ac.uk/news/consultation/ref-consultation-on-draft-panel-criteria-and-working-methods

14. Women’s leadership in higher education http://www.guardian.co.uk/higher-education-network/blog/2011/may/04/gender-equality-female-leadership-higher-education