Key documents for the Excellence in Research for Australia 2012 submission process were released on 16 September.
The ERA initiative assesses research quality within Australia’s higher education institutions by using a combination of bibliometric indicators along with international peer review committees.
The first full ERA evaluation was conducted by the Australian Research Council (ARC) in 2010. However, it prompted a degree of what innovation minister Kim Carr described at the time as “sector disquiet”, especially surrounding the issue of journal rankings.
In June 2011, Research ANZ reported that the government was planning a major shake-up of the initiative, including scrapping journal rankings, increasing capacity to accommodate multi-disciplinary research, and strengthening the peer review process.
The forthcoming round will open for submissions in March 2012.