Last year’s government spending review resulted in a substantial increase in MRC funding. Along with the UK’s other research councils the MRC needs to demonstrate to the government the quality, progress and impact of the research it supports.
Working with researchers it funds, the MRC has developed an online form to collect information on outputs from research programmes and grants. Ian Viney, head of evaluation at the MRC, said, “There is a vision to have a shared system across all research councils for the collection of research outputs and outcomes; by designing and implementing the MRC online system now, we are ensuring that the MRC is in the best possible position to help shape this joint approach.”
The form will be available later in September. The MRC wants to collect data on the outputs from current MRC funded agreements, and for agreements that ended in 2006, 2007 or 2008. Initial reports on the data gathered will be published early in 2009.
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