Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin - Institut für Bibliotheks- und Informations­wissen­schaft

Leonie van Drooge (Rathenau Institut, Netherlands): "The impacts of research infrastructures"

Abstract: For each and every stakeholder of a research infrastructure (RI), be it a user, a funder, a member state or–organization, the same research infrastructure has a different meaning. The infrastructure provides the opportunity to use tools, data or texts that are otherwise not accessible. It enables the development of novel research questions. Using the infrastructure equals developing human capacity. It fosters gender equality. The research provides valuable insights with societal relevance. New tools and technologies are useful outside of academia. The infrastructure strengthens collaborations across countries. Some of the above contributions, changes or impacts relate directly to the statutes of an RI, its mission and primary processes. To what is intended. Others relate to what a stakeholder expects, to a certain role of the RI. To what is expected. Some relate to core responsibilities of a RI, others to small contributions in a larger process. Some relate to academic research, others to political agendas. Each research infrastructure contributes in theory and in practice to a wide variety of impacts. Some impacts are more relevant than others. What impact, is not self-evident. It depends on what is expected and intended, on the operational phase and the governance of the RI, on the stakeholder and the evaluation context. What counts as evidence for an impact, is not self-evident either. However, it is clear that evidence should relate to goals, intentions and expectations, and that it can relate to final impacts as well as activities, choices and processes preceding impacts.

Leonie van Drooge is a senior science policy researcher, focusing on the organization and evaluation of societal impact. She has been / is involved in a number of projects and working groups dedicated to these issues, in particular focused on methods for societal impact assessment (FP7 SIAMPI); impact and evaluation of Social Sciences and Humanities research (COST action ENRESSH) and the assessment of societal impact of research infrastructures (H2020 ACCELERATE). Leonie prefers to work with and for stakeholders, such as research performing organizations, research funding organizations and ministries. She applies participative research methods and approaches, such as the joint development of theories of change, and focus group, open space and world cafe. She wants to understand why practices are the way they are, and not necessarily the way they are meant to be.Leonie works at the Dutch Rathenau Institute; its mission is to contribute to current, coming and urgent science and innovation policy issues; to shed light and propose options. ACCELERATE is funded by Horizon 2020, under grant agreement 73111.

Marianne Ping Huang: Associate Professor at School for Communication and Culture, Aarhus University (AU), developer of cultural creative collaborations and digital cultures. MPH collaborates with local, regional and European partners to enhance digital innovation in capacity building for creativity. MPH serves in DARIAH-EU as Co-Head for DARIAH Research and Education and organised DARIAH Innovation Forum 2017 (DARIAH Humanities at Scale, Horizon 2020).

Steven Krauwer got his degree in mathematics from Utrecht University in 1971, with a minor in linguistics. Since 1972 he has been working as a researcher, lecturer and project manager in the Utrecht institute of Linguistics of the Faculty of Humanities of Utrecht University. He has worked on formal languages, on computational linguistics (with a special focus machine translation), and since the mid-nineties on language and speech resources, with a special interest in under-resourced and endangered languages. He was the coordinator of the EC funded CLARIN project that led to the creation of the CLARIN Research Infrastructure and its governing body CLARIN ERIC. He was the first CLARIN ERIC Executive Director from 2012 until 2015. He is now guest researcher at the Faculty of Humanities of Utrecht University and senior advisor to the CLARIN ERIC Board of Directors.

Frank Uiterwaal's background lies in the field of history, with MAs in both Cultural History and in the interdisciplinary field of Cultural Heritage Studies. Within Horizon2020 project PARTHENOS, Frank is responsible for the activities focusing on communication, dissemination and outreach in the role of Work Package Leader. His other PARTHENOS project activities focus on common policies, standardisation and the provision of transnational access to Research Infrastructures. Past projects Frank has contributed in are Cultural Heritage Connections (Centre for International Heritage Activities) – a digital platform enabling cooperation in the heritage field – and HADRIANVS (Royal Netherlands Institute Rome) – a "digital gateway to the Dutch presence in Rome through the ages". Currently, Frank is affiliated with the NIOD Institute for War, Holocaust and Genocide studies in Amsterdam, which is part of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW).

Francesca Morselli: Francesca's academic background is in Media Studies (with majors in contemporary history and audiovisual semiotics) and Film Archiving. Before joining the DARIAH CIO team (in the context of DANS-KNAW-  Data Archiving and Networked Services in The Hague, NL) she worked and conducted research for European projects and institutions (Europeana; CEU) for the accessibility of cultural heritage, both directed to general users and academics. Before moving back to the Netherlands at the beginning of 2016, Francesca worked as a researcher for the CENDARI project at Trinity College Dublin, Ireland. At DANS-KNAW Francesca is a member of the research team and takes part in the European Project Parthenos as researcher within the Work Package on Common Policies and Implementation Strategies. She is involved in Research Infrastructure DARIAH-EU as part of the Chief Integration Office where she coordinates the DARIAH working groups by making sure that their grassroots nature and activities are integrated in the DARIAH endeavors

Sally Chambers is Digital Humanities Research Coordinator at Ghent Centre for Digital Humanities, Ghent University, where she coordinates Flemish and Belgian participation in DARIAH, the Digital Research Infrastructure for the Arts and Humanities. She is Vice-Chair of the DARIAH-EU National Coordinator Committee and member of the Senior Management Team. From 2011-2015, Sally was Secretary-General of DARIAH-EU, based in the Göttingen Centre for Digital Humanities, Germany.

David Budtz Pedersen (Aalborg Universitet, Denmark): "Responsible Impact Assessment in SSH"

Abstract: In this presentation I will introduce key building blocks for designing Responsible Impact Assessments by allowing research organisations to have significant influence on how their impact is represented and communicated. Moving beyond simplistic metrics for publications or economic benefits, the presentation outlines a new approach to assessing a wide range of research activities and its consequences for wider networks of policy-making, funding and research support. Drawing on the significant methodological pluralism emerging in the the current literature, I show that there is considerable room for researchers, universities and funding agencies to establish impact assessment tools directed towards specific "missions" while avoiding catch-all indicators and universal metrics.

David Budtz Pedersen is Professor and Co-Director of the Humanomics Research Centre in Copenhagen, Denmark. His research focuses on research management, impact assessment, and science-based policy-making. Dr. Budtz Pedersen is Strategic Adviser to the Danish Ministry of Higher Education and Science. David has about 100+ entries on his list of publications ranging from research papers, research monographs, edited volumes, policy reports, op-ed columns and newspaper articles. He has an international public presence with outreach activities in science policy, speaking frequently on the topic of research evaluation, open science, and the use of metrics. He is the recipient of numerous competitive research grants from the Danish Council for Independent Research (2008-2011), The Velux Foundation (2012-2019), The Danish Ministry of Higher Education and Science (2016-2017), The European Commission Horizon 2020 (2016-2019) and The Obel Family Foundation (2016-2019). He tweets as @Humanomicsmap.

Klaus Thoden (Max-Planck-Institut for the History of Science, Germany): "The impactomatrix - A catalog for impact factors and success vriteria"

Abstract: Digital research environments in the arts and humanities have to deal with the question what value they provide for the scientific community and how they should make the best use of their granted money. For digital tools and infrastructure components in the Digital Humanities, it is essential to define how they are impacting research practices in the Humanities and beyond. Understanding these implications will help to increase the visibility and transparency, communicate their benefits to potential researchers and funding agencies and strengthen the influence of digital research in the Humanities. The Impactomatrix gathers impact factors and success criteria for assessing projects in the arts and humanities. During assessment it is not sufficient to rely only on quantitative criteria – qualitative criteria have to be taken into account, as well. Besides this, the impactomatrix aims at providing a methodological basis for determining the value of developments in the Digital Humanities in general. 

Klaus Thoden is a Research Scholar at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science in Berlin. He received his Magister Artium (MA) in German language and linguistics from the Humboldt University, Berlin in 2008. Since 2012 he has been involved in national and international infrastructure projects (DM2E, TextGrid, DARIAH-DE), focussing his research on the influence of computers and the internet on the way scholars perform their work. This includes usability studies, the modelling of research activities, impact of digital tools and most recently research on the publication process in the humanities. Klaus is the technical coordinator of Edition Open Access, a publishing platform for open access publications.

Julia Fallon(Europeana, Netherlands): "Presentation of Europeana Impact Framework"

Abstract: In 2017 Europeana launched the impact playbook – the starting point for organisations wanting to explore their impact. The first version of the playbook helps organisations to better understand their impact and we'll take a look at what that entails as well as some of the results we have already got so far using it.

Julia Fallon: As a strategic policy advisor at Europeana, Julia Fallon works on developing frameworks (and playbooks) that motivate and facilitate cultural heritage institutions to open up their collections for reuse. Her time is split between managing copyright issues, the impact work and developing the RightsStatements.org Consortium.

Birge Wolf (Universität Kassel, Germany) and Stefan Lossow (Disy Informationssysteme GmbH, Germany): "SynSICRIS"

Abstract: The overall aim of our approach is to develop a tool that helps to assess and acknowledge the social benefits of applied research in addition to its scientific impact. Evaluation of social benefits of research is not trivial and commonly lacks easy to use data. Thus, elaborated collections of data through interviews and documentary analysis are frequently used – but they are too time-consuming to establish continuous assessment procedures. Accordingly, tools for continuous data collection needs to serve more purposes than evaluation. The development of the SynSICRIS tool aims to extend a current research information system (CRIS) by indicators for social contributions, such as "productive interactions" and the applicability of research results. In order to establish this instrument, synergies with funding processes and knowledge exchange are to be implemented: Researchers should be able to document directly in the CRIS and thus replace parts of text in applications and reports. Information and functions of the CRIS should support the funding bodies in the management of projects and programs. Knowledge transfer and exchange with practice and society should be facilitated by information and outputs tailored to the needs of target groups that are easy to search and mostly free accessible. In the future the use of such tools can support “open science and open practice infrastructures”. This allows to provide linked connections from scientific publications to research data as well as to outputs for practice and society, information on applicability and data on knowledge use and benefits. In the DARIAH-EU workshop we will present some of our approaches as well as mock-ups documenting the development of the SynSICRIS tool.

Birge Wolf studied Organic Agricultural Sciences at the University of Kassel with an interdisciplinary focus and is also trained in the design of participatory processes. For several years she worked on the question how to acknowledge the social benefits of agricultural research. She is currently coordinating the SynSICRIS project. SynSICRIS stands for "Synergies for social impacts in current research information systems". The monitoring and evaluation of the social benefits of applied research will be developed together with stakeholders from research, research funding, knowledge exchange, business and society. Synergies are to be substantiated and the availability of applicable research results shall be improved.

Stefan Lossow graduated in Meteorology from Freie Universität Berlin and took a PhD in Atmospheric Physics at Stockholm University. For many years he worked on the analysis of atmospheric trace constituents using numerous satellite observations and model simulations. Since early 2018 he works at Disy Informationssysteme GmbH focusing on the technical realisation of data and information systems within a number of research projects.

Esther De Smet: Esther is a classical scholar by training who ended up at the central Research Department of Ghent University as a Senior Policy Advisor. In that capacity she is involved in developing the research information system (aka GISMO) and the university's policy on societal value creation and impact. But her true calling is creating a stimulating and nurturing research environment at Ghent and putting all its wonderful research on the map. She leads workshops on communication strategy, impact, digital presence and social media. Twitter is her medium of choice: as proud curator of @ResearchUGent she hopes to change Flemish research communication for the better.

Jane Tinkler is Senior Prize Manager for the Nine Dots Prize, a major initiative for the social sciences. It aims to stimulate research into vital but under-examined questions with a relevance to today's world.  She recently spent a year seconded to the UK Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology (POST) as Senior Adviser in social science. She has been a social science researcher for nearly ten years working on applied projects with government, civil society and academic partners. Prior to joining POST, she was based in the Public Policy Group at the London School of Economics where she worked on the impact of academic research in the social sciences. Her recent publications include: (with Simon Bastow and Patrick Dunleavy) (2014) The Impact of the Social Sciences: How academics and their work makes a difference.

Trilce Navarrete is specialist in the economic and historic aspects of digital heritage. Her work merges theories of economics, heritage and information science to support understanding of digital heritage production, distribution, and consumption. She has contributed to the creation of the European statistics for digital heritage (ENUMERATE), is advisor at the European Group of Museum Statistics (EGMUS), has been involved in several European projects related to digital heritage economics, and has served as advisor for the creation and evaluation of (national) digital infrastructures. Her research has been driven by an interest to understand the processes involved in the (re)use of heritage materials and their role in the transfer of knowledge across time. Navarrete holds a PhD in Humanities, an MA in Cultural Economics and MA in Museum Management. Navarrete is currently lecturer at Erasmus University Rotterdam.

Jens Bley is a researcher, executive consultant and entrepreneur, focusing on strategies, research & development and producing of digital transformation in cities; Co-founder of the eCultureLab at the HafenCity University; Initiator of SmartSquare, a federally funded Smart Cities strategic revitalization project; Initiator and Co-Host of Coding da Vinci North, a cultural hackathon and innovation sprint with cultural institutions from northern Germany, Denmark and Sweden; Initiator and producer of eCulture forums; speaker (including keynote) and workshop organizer at various innovation conferences in Europe, USA, Asia, Australia; Co-Organizer of the TEDxHamburg events; active member of the Europeana Network and member of the Europeana Impact Modelling Task Force.; Co-Founder of the Smart City advisory work group of the Hamburg Chamber of Commerce and long time member of the advisory board for digital economy. Management Board Member of the Network of Digital Economy in Hamburg. Previously: award winning producer for kids edutainment in cooperation with National Geographic and distribution into 70 territories; co-founder of an internet agency; Board Member, European board of global eBusiness strategy company; Head of television and animation studios; Visiting Professor for Content Economy at the University of Arts Berlin. Fulbright scholar at the University of Florida.

Helen Small (University of Oxford, UK): "Use case approach to impact measurement"

Abstract: This presentation will address the purposes and evolving formats of the case-study approach to research Impact measurement. Using examples from the 2014 UK Research Excellence Framework, it will explore the nature and scope of the claims case studies typically put forward, and the kinds of data that make for more and less persuasive evidence of the impact claimed, its scope, and its significance. Brief attention will be paid to the question of how best to represent collaborative research, and to ongoing debate about how best to secure that quality of research remains the primary goal of research assessment.

Prof. Helen Small is Jonathan and Julia Aisbitt Fellow in English Literature at Pembroke College, Oxford, and Merton Professor of English Language and Literature elect at the University of Oxford. Her books include The Value of the Humanities (OUP, 2013), with associated audio podcasts at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f9uQmVDraQg and on Oxford iTunes. She is a member of the assessment panel for the UK Research Excellence Framework, 2021, and has ongoing responsibility for producing the Oxford English Faculty's Impact Case Studies (c. 13 to yield c. 10 per research assessment exercise).