Final Report Summary - EUKNOW (European Universities in the area of Knowledge. Collaboration and networks in teaching and research)
The research activities developed during the ERG fellowship were broadly concerned with the rise of collaboration and networks within, across, and beyond Universities. The research questions that cut across the EUKnow research agenda, as a whole, were:
1- to what extent do networked collaborative formations
a) accommodate epistemic, professional and individual preferences and priorities?
b) respond to institutional and national higher education and research frameworks, incentives and demands?
2- in what ways do networks
a) elicit strategies of differentiation and constructions of excellence?
b) exclude and/or include actors with respect to the production, circulation and use of knowledge?
The ERG grant facilitated and stimulated the development of a research programme consisting of three inter-related research studies, a range of research collaborations, and activities of dissemination.
1- Conceptions and practice of collaborative research in an ‘Open Research Area’: Funding collaboration or collaboration for funding?
The study drew on the Open Research Area (ORA) multilateral awards, a Social Sciences research programme funded by national research agencies/councils in England, France, Germany and the Netherlands (with the later addition of the US). Interviews with 18 Principal Investigators were conducted combined with a mapping analysis of publicly available data (e.g. published project summaries, grantees’ CVs, bibliometric information, etc.). The findings led to a typology of research collaborations which shows that research collaboration and network activity differ according to researchers' individual positions, their knowledge claims, and the forms of epistemic authority and control exercised. This research project was developed and carried out collaboratively with Dr Yann Lebeau (University of East Anglia).
2- Universities, their communities and networks within Knowledge societies
The focus of the inquiry here was on the changing function and role of higher education within the globalised era of networks. Synergies were created with a large multinational team of researchers funded by the European Science Foundation. The ‘Change in Networks, Higher Education and Knowledge Societies (CINHEKS)’ project was a collaborative multi-country investigation into how higher education institutions are networked in Knowledge Societies in Europe, Russia, the USA and Japan, drawing on the profiles and case studies of 28 universities. Although it was evident that the time of the 'networked university' has come for all institutions in the sample, what kinds of universities they are becoming, as a result of this networking, and what control they can exert over its consequences, were important issues that emerged, with clear implications for Higher Education differentiation and stratification.
3) New and Old Worlds of Internationalisation in Higher Education: Change and continuities
This is a longstanding area of research interest which was stimulated by the Marie-Curie Intra-European Fellowship (EIF), and further expanded and consolidated through the ERG fellowship. The study provided insights into the ways in which internationalisation policies associated with goals of creating competitive 'world-class' study programmes, through stronger collaboration, permeate Higher Education contexts, and are then shifted into academic initiatives and action.
The fellow has been appointed a permanent academic staff in the School of Education at the University of Sheffield.
Dr Vassiliki Papatsiba v.papatsiba@sheffield.ac.uk
1- to what extent do networked collaborative formations
a) accommodate epistemic, professional and individual preferences and priorities?
b) respond to institutional and national higher education and research frameworks, incentives and demands?
2- in what ways do networks
a) elicit strategies of differentiation and constructions of excellence?
b) exclude and/or include actors with respect to the production, circulation and use of knowledge?
The ERG grant facilitated and stimulated the development of a research programme consisting of three inter-related research studies, a range of research collaborations, and activities of dissemination.
1- Conceptions and practice of collaborative research in an ‘Open Research Area’: Funding collaboration or collaboration for funding?
The study drew on the Open Research Area (ORA) multilateral awards, a Social Sciences research programme funded by national research agencies/councils in England, France, Germany and the Netherlands (with the later addition of the US). Interviews with 18 Principal Investigators were conducted combined with a mapping analysis of publicly available data (e.g. published project summaries, grantees’ CVs, bibliometric information, etc.). The findings led to a typology of research collaborations which shows that research collaboration and network activity differ according to researchers' individual positions, their knowledge claims, and the forms of epistemic authority and control exercised. This research project was developed and carried out collaboratively with Dr Yann Lebeau (University of East Anglia).
2- Universities, their communities and networks within Knowledge societies
The focus of the inquiry here was on the changing function and role of higher education within the globalised era of networks. Synergies were created with a large multinational team of researchers funded by the European Science Foundation. The ‘Change in Networks, Higher Education and Knowledge Societies (CINHEKS)’ project was a collaborative multi-country investigation into how higher education institutions are networked in Knowledge Societies in Europe, Russia, the USA and Japan, drawing on the profiles and case studies of 28 universities. Although it was evident that the time of the 'networked university' has come for all institutions in the sample, what kinds of universities they are becoming, as a result of this networking, and what control they can exert over its consequences, were important issues that emerged, with clear implications for Higher Education differentiation and stratification.
3) New and Old Worlds of Internationalisation in Higher Education: Change and continuities
This is a longstanding area of research interest which was stimulated by the Marie-Curie Intra-European Fellowship (EIF), and further expanded and consolidated through the ERG fellowship. The study provided insights into the ways in which internationalisation policies associated with goals of creating competitive 'world-class' study programmes, through stronger collaboration, permeate Higher Education contexts, and are then shifted into academic initiatives and action.
The fellow has been appointed a permanent academic staff in the School of Education at the University of Sheffield.
Dr Vassiliki Papatsiba v.papatsiba@sheffield.ac.uk