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Coara call aims to stimulate reform by supporting pilot activities and knowledge exchange initiatives
The group helping to implement the EU-backed Agreement on Reforming Research Assessment has launched a call offering funding to support organisations with their reforms.
Launched in 2022, the agreement is intended to make assessment fairer and more reflective of the breadth of research roles, including through greater use of qualitative evaluation methods.
The Coalition for Advancing Research Assessment is helping to implement the agreement and has been given about €5 million by the EU to implement the Coara Boost project, with €2.75m to be cascaded to other institutions.
A first call under this initiative opened on 26 April and is offering €1.1m for 20 to 25 projects intended to facilitate the exchange of good practice, speed up the reform of assessment practices and support the development and testing of new practices.
The call will close on 26 June. A second call due to open in December will distribute the rest of the money.
Developing critical mass
The Coara Boost project strengthens Coara’s “operational capacity” and “provides a means to develop a critical mass for reforming research assessment”, the coalition said.
The first call aims to “enhance institutional change and target pilot and exchange-of-knowledge initiatives”.
Coara expects the funding to produce a “diverse portfolio of projects…that will translate the shared vision outlined in the agreement into tangible, lasting institutional changes in research assessment practices”.
Eligible applicants include legal entities based in the EU and countries associated to the Horizon Europe research and innovation programme.