The ARC held an online consultation today on the Second Policy Review Discussion Paper on the National Competitive Grants Program for discipline Peak Bodies and Learned Academies. The DDCA was pleased to attend and represent the interests of its creative arts members. The ARC is clear in their desire to collaborate with the Peak Bodies in refining the new model that has been proposed and writing in the details that will achieve the intentions to:
- support ALL disciplines equally
- take greater risks in the ideas they fund
- support researchers in the full lifecycle of their careers
- connect with universities, other funding opportunities and support mechanisms to ensure sustainable and long careers for researchers
- support collaborative and interdisciplinary research projects
Evaluation and peer-review are topics that have been turning up often in government reviews of research and funding models. Whilst the creative arts sector has a particular stake, these are not isolated problems. The ARC acknowledged today that across the board ‘people feel they are drowning in peer-reviews’, which leads to substandard, unfair, unhelpful, and inconsistent peer-review reports – and this needs to be addressed. As a sector, and with particular responsibility taken by peak bodies and other leaders, we need to create capacity, we need to educate and support peer-reviewers. The answer for the creative arts in particular cannot be replacing peer-reviews with data-driven metrics.
The DDCA will hold two National Online Forums on these topics later in the year – details of which will be announced shortly – which we intend will support the ARC in this work and generate the detail of what a fairer, more vibrant and inclusive research culture looks like across peer-review, evaluation and funding.
Read the DDCA response to the National Competitive Grants Program Policy Review.