Council of Australian Postgraduate Associations Incorporated

Name (Individual/Organisation)

Council of Australian Postgraduate Associations Incorporated

Responses

Q1. How could the purpose in the ARC Act be revised to reflect the current and future role of the ARC?

For example, should the ARC Act be amended to specify in legislation:
(a) the scope of research funding supported by the ARC
(b) the balance of Discovery and Linkage research programs
(c) the role of the ARC in actively shaping the research landscape in Australia
(d) any other functions?

If so, what scope, functions and role?

If not, please suggest alternative ways to clarify and define these functions.

The scope of the Australian Research Council should be restricted to promoting research based on academic merit and not by any political influence. Its role should be to facilitate, support and disseminate research knowledge in science, technology and humanities. This would be similar to that of its overseas counterparts (i.e. United Kingdom Research and Innovation - UKRI).1 National priorities should not be part of the ARC's agenda. Instead, they should be directed in consultation and collaboration with the Office of the Chief Scientist of Australia and CSIRO. These other government agencies are already responsible for advising the government and engaging with the business community. Therefore, the ARC should be focused on shaping Australia's research by promoting the fundamental principles of academic research. The ARC should promote good academic practices by recommending research proposals strictly on how it will apply academic principles to discover new knowledge. Discovery research grants promote the diversity of ideas and blue-sky research. Germany, for example, has the Max Planck Society, funded by federal and state governments and focuses primarily on basic (blue-sky research).2

Q2. Do you consider the current ARC governance model is adequate for the ARC to perform its functions?

If not, how could governance of the ARC be improved? For example, should the ARC Act be amended to incorporate a new governance model that establishes a Board on the model outlined in the consultation paper, or another model.

Please expand on your reasoning and/or provide alternative suggestions to enhance the governance, if you consider this to be important.

The current governance structure of the ARC that is centralised around the CEO should be restructured with a governance board similar to that of the UK (UKRI) and Canadian (NRC) counterparts - see Appendix A & B. Existing committees including the ERA, could retain their function as form sub

Q3. How could the Act be improved to ensure academic and research expertise is obtained and maintained to support the ARC?

How could this be done without the Act becoming overly prescriptive?

There has been growing cynicism within the research community that those selected into appointed positions are often perceived as former university executives and 'corporate types'. The ARC Board and its subcommittees can include a rotation of active researchers by appointment or election. An example of membership and elections can be found in the Royal Society of New Zealand, which could provide a sense of ownership to the research community.3

Q4. Should the ARC Act be amended to consolidate the pre-eminence or importance of peer review?

Please provide any specific suggestions you may have for amendment of the Act, and/or for non-legislative measures.

The ideals of the 'Haldane principle' in British policy that 'decisions about what to spend research funds on should be made by researchers rather than politicians' is also something the ARC should adopt. The current ARC act refers to the CEO recommending individual research programs for ministerial approval. However, the ARC Act could be amended so that the minister is to approve a 'research schedule' that is recommended to them by the ARC board. The ARC research schedule will entail the complete list of projects (as a package) and the funding allocations within the prescribed budget set by the minister. This way, the minister may still retain control of the research budget and refute the research schedule.
as a whole but would limit their interventions to individual research projects.

Q5. Please provide suggestions on how the ARC, researchers and universities can better preserve and strengthen the social licence for public funding of research?

Research from public funding should be open access to allow for transparency with the taxpayers that
fund the research. The general public should not need to 'pay twice', once in taxes and second in journal
subscription, to access research funded from the public purse.
Adopting the 'corporate culture' at our universities actively undermines integrity and credibility as the
third voice of reason in social discourses. Where academia is often the pursuit of truth and knowledge,
financial motivation becomes an overwhelming priority; universities risk losing their social licence with
the general public. The social contract of trust between the general public and academics plays a
crucial role in public research funding.

Q6. What elements of ARC processes or practices create administrative burdens and/or duplication of effort for researchers, research offices and research partners?

Acomprehensive research proposal may consume ~100-120 hours of preparation. Consequently, many
researchers (lecturers and supervisors) allocate a substantial amount of their workload preparing grant
proposals rather than teaching and performing research.
The time constraints for preparing grant proposals favour established researchers, that often have
junior researchers generating results and publications while they focus on preparing research
proposals. Researchers may have carer responsibilities and early career researchers who must conduct
their research themselves, teach whilst preparing a proposal and make other real-life commitments.
If the early screening stages of the grant application process can be simplified to a 2-3 page expression
of interest document, this could reduce the amount of time academics invest in preparing a proposal
with a success rate of ~14%.

Q7. What improvements could be made:

(a) to ARC processes to promote excellence, improve agility, and better facilitate globally collaborative research and partnerships while maintaining rigour, excellence and peer review at an international standard?

(b) to the ARC Act to give effect to these process improvements, or do you suggest other means?

Please include examples of success or best practice from other countries or communities if you have direct experience of these.

We will include some suggestions in a follow-up document.

Q8. With respect to ERA and EI:

(a) Do you believe there is a need for a highly rigorous, retrospective excellence and impact assessment exercise, particularly in the absence of a link to funding?

(b) What other evaluation measures or approaches (e.g. data driven approaches) could be deployed to inform research standards and future academic capability that are relevant to all disciplines, without increasing the administrative burden?

(c) Should the ARC Act be amended to reference a research quality, engagement and impact assessment function, however conducted?

(d) If so, should that reference include the function of developing new methods in research assessment and keeping up with best practice and global insights?

The screening process of retrospective excellence in the current ARC process is one of the main
challenges many early career researchers struggle to overcome. It is largely agreed upon that the PhD
journey is different for every person, and the outputs are sometimes out of the student's control - i.e.
disruptions from the COVID pandemic. Some students receive more support than others during their
PhD, which can contribute to a more robust publication profile upon graduating. This leaves students
that did not receive the same support less competitive in the grant application process.
Furthermore, screening for retrospective excellence is an austerity measure to minimise the risk of
failure. However, we must consider that research explores unknown knowledge where the outcome is
undetermined. Consequently, past track records are not necessarily strong predictors of future outcomes. If the ARC is to provide funding based on academic principles, grants should be funded
solely based on the application quality.
One of the concerns for many graduates is the advice that choosing industry over academia upon
graduating will affect our publication track record and competitiveness in grant applications.
Consequently, many young academics see going to the industry as the land of no return because the
experience and achievements in the industry would not be recognised within the ARC selection process.
Our recommendation is a more significant consideration for recognising evidence of engaging in
research outside the academic setting, such as patents and commercialisation in a relevant industry.

Q9. With respect to the ARC’s capability to evaluate research excellence and impact:

(a) How can the ARC best use its expertise and capability in evaluating the outcomes and benefits of research to demonstrate the ongoing value and excellence of Australian research in different disciplines and/or in response to perceived problems?

(b) What elements would be important so that such a capability could inform potential collaborators and end-users, share best practice, and identify national gaps and opportunities?

(c) Would a data-driven methodology assist in fulfilling this purpose?

We will include some suggestions in a follow-up document.

Q10. Having regard to the Review’s Terms of Reference, the ARC Act itself, the function, structure and operation of the ARC, and the current and potential role of the ARC in fostering excellent Australian research of global significance, do you have any other comments or suggestions?

The research preparation for this consultation paper led us to some interesting findings when we looked
into different agencies in countries including the UK, US, Canada, NZ and Germany. Unfortunately, due
to time constraints, we could not provide some of these suggestions in this document, but we should
be able to produce a complete document by the end of 2022.
However, a summarise some of our early findings include:
● The ARC Act does not include the function and purpose beyond recommending research
programs to the minister. This is an unusual exception to many other of its overseas
counterparts, which typically includes its objective and purpose towards academic endeavours.
● The ARC is the only organisation we found that did not have a board or council equivalent
responsible for governance.

Submission received

19 December 2022 (extension given)

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