Evaluation

infos
Creation date: 
01/03/2007
Address: 

Head: 15 parvis René-Descartes, 69007 Lyon - FRANCE

Office: 190 avenue de France, 75013 Paris - FRANCE

Phone: 
+33 (0)1 49 54 22 55
textes
texte 1: 

In accordance with the provisions of its founding documents, the Network of French Institutes for Advanced Study (Réseau français des instituts d’études avancées – RFIEA) has designed an evaluation system that can be applied to its constituent institutes for advanced study (IAS). The work was conducted in the conviction that the system should take full account of the characteristics of the IASs as innovative institutions with a specific role to play in the French research system.

 

Between the spring of 2008 and the fall of 2009, the RFIEA organised four working seminars:

• in Nantes, June 2008, to lay the conceptual foundations for thought in an international context (with the participation of AERES, the French agency for evaluation of research and higher education);

• in Aix-en-Provence, January 2009, to discuss the first version of the evaluation principles;

• in Lyon, May 2009, to specify the evaluation criteria in consultation with the management of the four IASs;

• in Nantes, June 2009, to finalise the evaluation instrument in consultation with the RFIEA’s international scientific advisory board.

 

The evaluation system adopted by the RFIEA’s governing board in December 2009 is the result of this collegial effort. It is in two parts: the frame of reference for evaluation of the IASs (part 1) and the evaluation instrument itself (part 2).

 

The system was designed with an eye to giving the RFIEA’s scientific advisory board a leading role. Evaluation of the institutes’ activities is properly the task of this independent body, made up of internationally recognised scholars from various regions of the world and working in various fields in the social sciences and humanities. This international, multidisciplinary membership (12 members) gives the scientific board the legitimacy and capacity required to evaluate the IASs.

texte 2: 

The evaluation instrument uses a detailed grid combining descriptive analysis with qualitative and quantitative indicators to assess the research conditions, activities and results of each institute. The grid provides the RFIEA with standardised information on the institutes’ activities, while accommodating the specific situation of each institute. It is supplemented by open questions to be answered by the management teams of the institutes, on the extent to which they achieved their goals, and by the fellows, on how they benefited from their period of residence. The responses to these questions give a better idea of the diversity and the unexpected, innovative nature of the results.

 

Detailed evaluation grid

 

 

1.  Constitution of a scientific community specific to the IAS

 

Scientific policy of the IAS

 

 

Resident fellow selection procedures

 

Membership and functioning of the scientific advisory board

Scientific community

Number of applications received, of invitations and of researcher-months; mean fellowship duration and the distribution of the mean; percentage of non-French researchers (broken down by geographical area), of researchers invited to France for the first time, of collective and interdisciplinary invitations, and of junior researchers

Policy on fellows’ remuneration

Statistical distribution of remuneration levels

Working conditions

Housing, offices, areas for socialising

Community rules

 

 

 

Policy on documentation and library services

 

Publications policy

Number and characteristics of works published by fellows during and since their period of residence

Possibility of and conditions for hosting researchers from other IASs

 

 

System for tracking fellows’ careers

  

 

 

 

 2.  Change and innovation

 

Avenues of research

Frequency and dynamics of change in the institute’s main areas of research

Openness to interdisciplinary projects

Relationships with scholars in other disciplines (humanities and social sciences, or interfacing with the exact sciences and life sciences)

Acceptance of risk

 

Support and scientific activities

Diversity, frequency and characteristics of scientific discussions and activities

Emergence of new fields of long-term research

  

 

 

 

3. Internationalisation of French research potential

 

Mechanisms for contacts with local and French researchers

 

Building stronger relationships with researchers in priority geographic areas

Mediterranean area, North/South axis, emerging countries

Establishment of scientific partnerships (French and international)

 

Structuring of local and national research potential

Development of collaborative arrangements with resident fellows, participation in French or foreign research contracts, participation in the training of junior scholars, sitting on doctoral juries

 

texte 3: 

The IAS evaluations are conducted over a 12-month period in order to get some temporal perspective and obtain all the information needed to carry out such a task properly.

 

In the spring of 2011, each institute – having already sent a self-evaluation report and detailed questionnaire to the entire scientific advisory board – received a two-day visit from a team of four board members. The team of evaluators spoke with the institute’s management team, the members of the scientific advisory board, the fellows currently in residence and the institute’s partners (university presidents, directors of research laboratories, associate researchers).

 

In June 2011, the scientific advisory board will hold a plenary session to prepare an initial evaluation based on the interim reports produced for each institute.

 

In the fall of 2011, a second wave of visits will be conducted to fine-tune certain aspects of the final report, learn about the latest scientific and institutional developments, and meet the new group of resident fellows.

 

In November 2011, the scientific advisory board will again meet in plenary session to complete the evaluation report and formally submit it to the RFIEA governing board.

éléments liés
iea: 
Collegium de Lyon
Nantes IAS
IMéRA of Marseille
Paris-IAS
candidater: 
EURIAS
IAS
SSRC-ANR