REF 2014: What does it mean for education and educational research?

The outcomes for Education of REF 2014 will be published on 18^th December 2014. BERA awaits these outcomes with great interest, having been clearly committed to the continuing improvement of quality in educational research over recent years. Not least we are interested in how the new dimension of the ’impact’ of educational research has been demonstrated by institutions across the four nations of the UK.

To assist in the review and interpretation of these outcomes, BERA invited the Chair of the Education Sub-Panel, Andrew Pollard, to provide a short commentary and to suggest documents which may help in contextualising the outcomes.

At our annual meeting for Heads of Department, Andrew and some colleagues from the Sub-Panel have kindly agreed to lead us in reviewing the outcomes and the implications of the exercise. This will take place on February 3^rd in London. BERA Council will also discuss the REF outcomes at our away day to be held in May.

This page on our website will be updated again when the official ‘overview report’ for Education becomes available in early 2015. It will be augmented too if other helpful commentaries are suggested or when contributions by others become available. We urge BERA members to join in these discussions which are likely to have a profound influence not only directly on us but also on our institutions and other networks and organisation.

The spring edition of Research Intelligence will be a special issue on: ‘REF: Changing Educational Landscapes’. Ideas and contributions for this should be sent to the editorial team.