Blog Post: Does New Zealand’s serve on research evaluation tell us anything about the future of the REF?

Half a planet away, in New Zealand, something interesting was happening. A new government had come to power. A reference group had been beavering for two years, developing guidelines and specifications for the looming 2026 quality evaluation under the REF-like Performance Based Research Fund (PBRF). But then, the Tertiary Education Commission (TEC) abruptly announced that it was all off. The 2026 research quality evaluation was scrapped. Despite the years of work. Despite the 14 consultation papers and published guidelines.

Why?

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