Introduction

While the national evaluation provides information about the whole university and serves the Ministry of Education and Science for financing universities, the institutional evaluation provides strategic information about scientific activities at the level of individual disciplines, departments and doctoral study programmes of MU. MU began reforming its research evaluation based almost exclusively on metrics in 2019. After adjusting the funding rules and introducing a performance component, the Internal Research and Doctoral Studies Evaluation (IRDE) followed in 2022. The system culminated with a contract funding component in 2024.

The evaluation activities at MU consist of three components that have a clearly defined purpose and do not directly influence each other: the Internal Research and Doctoral Studies Evaluation, Bibliometrics and Funding. Bibliometrics is used for monitoring the environment and supporting strategies, not for research evaluation. Funding uses only a small part of performance indicators and IRDE does not directly influence funding.

MU is building a responsible approach to research evaluation. Our approach is based mainly on the Dutch SEP and the UK REF evaluation models and on international initiatives developing the concept and ideals of Responsible Research Assessment (RRA), in particular DORA, the Leiden manifesto, the Agreement on Reforming Research Assessment and the Scope framework.