Institutional repositories and research assessment in the UK

[Stevan Harnad]

Excerpt from Peter Suber's Open Access News
http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/2005_01_23_fosblogarchive.html#a110675531506890278

Michael Day, Institutional repositories and research assessment,
http://www.rdn.ac.uk/projects/eprints-uk/docs/studies/rae/rae-study.pdf
a supporting study for the ePrints UK
http://www.rdn.ac.uk/projects/eprints-uk/docs/
project, v. 0.1 (draft), December 2, 2004.
Abstract: 'This study concerns the potential role of
institutional repositories in supporting research assessment in
universities with specific reference to the Research Assessment
Exercises in the UK. After a brief look at research evaluation
methods, it introduces the UK Research Assessment Exercise (RAE),
focusing on its role in determining the distribution of research
funding, the assessment process itself, and some concerns that have
been raised by participants and observers. The study will then
introduce institutional repositories and consider the ways in which
they might be used to enhance the research assessment process in the
UK. It will first consider the role of repositories in providing
institutional support for the submission and review process. Secondly,
the paper will consider the ways in which citation linking between
papers in repositories might be used as the basis for generating
quantitative data on research impact that could be used for
assessment. Thirdly, this study will consider other ways in which
repositories might be able to provide quantitative data, e.g. usage
statistics or Webometric link data, which may be able to be used -
together with other indicators - to support the evaluation of
research.'