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REF 2021 confirm City is research focused and world leading

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  5. REF 2021 confirm City is research focused and world leading

The results show that 86% of City’s submission to the REF was rated as being of world-leading (4*) and internationally excellent (3*) quality

Published Friday, 20th May, 2022 in University news

City’s position as research focused and world-leading university has been confirmed through the announcement of the Research Excellence Framework (REF) 2021 results. The results show that 86% of City’s submission to the REF was rated as being of world-leading (4*) and internationally excellent (3*) quality. This is an increase of 10% from the last REF in 2014 and 35% since the Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) in 2008.

Some highlights from the REF include:

  • City is 39th in the UK out of 129 universities with an improvement of 12 places since REF 2014 (excluding specialist institutions).
  • City is 44th out of 156 submissions with an improvement of 16 places since REF 2014.
  • The proportion of City’s research rated world–leading (4*) has almost doubled to 40% in REF 2021 (from 23% in 2014).
  • City is 30th in terms of Grade Point Average (GPA) for the Outputs profile out of 129 universities, which is an increase of 18 places since REF 2014 (excluding specialist institutions).
  • City’s institutional GPA has improved by +0.30 to 3.25 (from 2.95 in 2014). All individual Units of Assessment (UoA) improved their overall GPA compared to 2014.

Purpose and process of the REF

The REF assesses research quality at all UK higher education research institutions, providing national and international benchmarks to help us understand how our research quality measures against other institutions. The REF assesses the strength of research quality across UK Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) and measures three components: Outputs (60%); Impact (25%); Environment (15%). They are aggregated to form the overall ‘quality profile’.

Professor Miguel Mera, Vice-President (Research) said:

These results show a great improvement in research standing since 2014 and are a fantastic achievement for City.

To learn more about the REF results, visit the Research in Focus microsite, which includes an overview of City’s research, a snapshot of our REF results and videos and articles about research projects and their impact on the world.

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