Responsible Research Evaluation

At Coventry, our 2030 Group Strategy and our 2030 Research Strategy set out our ambition to focus research on innovation and economic and societal challenges. Delivering local, national and international outcomes and impact and building high performing transdisciplinary research teams to deliver excellence and impact.

As an institution, we are committed to ensuring that we use research metrics responsibly to support the delivery of our Group strategy 2030. As such, we created our own Standard in 2019 on the appropriate use of metrics in research evaluation setting out our Group approach. Aligned with the 10 principles of the Leiden Manifesto, this standard aims to provide clarity for those involved in producing and understanding metrics, as well as enabling good practice across the group.

In 2023, we became a signatory of the San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA). DORA is a worldwide initiative highlighting the need to improve the ways in which the outputs from scholarly research are evaluated across all scholarly disciplines with practical and robust approaches. Our commitment to DORA as well as our own standard reflects the value we place on diversity, inclusivity and supporting our researchers across disciplines and at all stages of their careers.

The overriding principle of DORA is to break the assumed link between certain metrics and research quality. Recommending qualitative judgments are exercised alongside appropriate quantitative indicators ensuring research is judged upon its own merits.