Science Foundation Ireland leads move towards qualitative indicators, but academic culture proves hard to change
Funders and researchers in Ireland have long recognised the need to move away from a reliance on quantitative measures of research quality towards a more holistic, qualitative approach to assessment.
In 2019, Ireland’s main funding body, Science Foundation Ireland (SFI), became a signatory of the San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment (Dora). At the time, the funding agency committed to assessing the quality and impact of research through “means other than journal metrics, such as journal impact factors”.