RAE classes School as 'World Leading' research centre
Thursday, December 18, 2008
The Cardiff School of Journalism, Media and Cultural Studies has been classed as a 'World Leading' research centre by this year’s Research Assessment Exercise.
In total 75% of the research submitted by the School was classified as either 'World Leading' or 'Internationally Excellent'.
| Communication, Cultural and Media Studies | ||
|---|---|---|
| Institution | Number of 4* FTE Staff | |
| Goldsmiths | 9.8 | 1 st |
| Westminster | 9.6 | 2 nd |
| Cardiff | 7.4 | 3 rd |
| Nottingham Trent | 6.3 | 4 th |
| Leicester B | 5.7 | 5 th |
| LSE | 4.8 | 6 th |
Table continues to 47 th
The RAE classified 45% of the School’s research output as World Leading' or 4* and a further 30% as '‘Internationally Excellent' or 3*, the two highest classifications available. The results place the School in the top three of 47 UK institutions in the fields of communication, cultural and media studies, based on the volume of staff working at a world-leading level.
Head of School Professor Justin Lewis described the results as "an acknowledgement that we are one of the world-leading research institutions in the field of Communication, Cultural and Media Studies."
School Director of Research Professor Jenny Kitzinger, who co-ordinated the submission, said "This reflects the highly significant and excellent research taking place here in Cardiff."
Research at the School
The School of Journalism, Media and Cultural Studies (JOMEC) continues to hold a distinctive position in the UK as it is equally respected for the quality of its teaching and research, with both serving to re-enforce the other.
Major research awards from the main funding councils, as well as the BBC and bodies such as Oxfam and Amnesty International demonstrated the high profile of bodies seeking to undertake research with the School.
JOMEC has a strong research infrastructure and benefits from a state-of-the-art digital media monitoring facility. This is complemented by comprehensive archives of news reporting, historical media archives including the Richard Stott Daily Mirror Papers and the renowned Cudlipp Collection.
About the RAE
Research institutions across the UK submitted their research to the RAE 2008 earlier this year to establish their quality profile. The four higher education funding bodies use these profiles to determine the size of the research grant each institution can expect to receive for 2009-10.
| Communication, Cultural and Media Studies | ||
|---|---|---|
| Institution | 4* and 3* Research Power | |
| Goldsmiths | 6184.5 | 1 st |
| Nottingham Trent | 5886.75 | 2 nd |
| Westminster | 5280 | 3 rd |
| Cardiff | 4455 | 4 th |
| Sussex | 4428 | 5 th |
| UWE Bristol | 4290 | 6 th |
Table continues to 47 th
Unlike previous RAE results, the 2008 ‘quality profiles’ contain a number of variables and do not clearly translate into one league table. The ‘Grade Point Average’ (GPA) weights the proportion of results according to quality level. (For example ‘World Leading’ multiplied by a weighting of four, ‘Internationally Excellent’ multiplied by three etc.) It takes no account of the number of staff submitted to the RAE.
A Research Power index multiplies all quality levels by the number of staff submitted, which measure tends to favour bigger institutions.
One measure which tends to avoid undue bias towards larger institutions while taking account of the volume of research staff is Research Power index based on work at levels 3* and 4*. By this index the School is placed 4th out of 47.
Related Links:
Full School results and research profile on the main Cardiff Website
See also:
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