Evaluation of the Finnish Centres of Excellence Programmes

1. Evaluation of the Finnish Centres of Excellence Programmes Dr Ritva Dammert Director Brussels May 27, 2009

2. Background of the Finnish CoE programmes • In Finland, CoEs have been selected since 1994, in the beginning by the Ministry of Education and later in the CoE programmes administered by the Academy of Finland • The CoE programmes were initiated 1998 based on the Finland’s National Strategy of CoE Policy (1997) • The objective has been the development of creative research environments, where the internationally competitive research has integrated with high level researcher training • The strategy has been implemented by the Academy of Finland’s six-year fixed-term CoE programmes during 2000–2005, 2002–2007, 2006–2011 and 2008–2013.

3. Description of Finnish Centers of Excellence • CoE is a research or researcher training unit that is at the international cutting edge of research in its field • Consists of one or more research teams • Shares a common set of research objectives and works under a joint management • May be composed of research teams operating both at universities and research institutes, also in cooperation with business companies • Funding for CoEs comes not only from the Academy but also from universities and research institutes as well as other partners • CoEs are selected through competition based on an international peer review for a six year period The amount of CoEs in Finland has settled to about 40 CoEs

4. Present-form Centres of Excellence in research

5. Evaluation covered CoE programmes 2000–2005 and 2002–2007 *) Includes also the funding of support functions, about 7,5 M€ • Altogether 42 CoEs and 105 M€ of CoE programme funding between 2000-2007 • The research budgets of these CoEs in total 585 M€ • Large variation in the size of the CoEs (between 20 and over 100 researchers) • Host organisations: 10 universities and 4 research institutes • In addition to CoE funding, the CoEs have received 131 M€ other Academy funding 1999–2007, and also Tekes funding • More information: www.aka.fi

6. Objectives and Requirements • Evaluation questions: • How has the CoE programme achieved its objectives? • What additional value have the CoE programmes produced for the research and innovation system? • How can the CoE programmes and the CoE strategy be developed through the experience gained from the first programmes? • Requirements: • External evaluation – Evaluators selected through competition (Gaia Consulting Ltd together with Dialogic BV (the Netherlands)) • Impact assessment – Scientific quality assessment and efficiency of the programme implementation were excluded from the evaluation • Forward looking – Results will be used for up-dating national CoE strategy

7. Four viewpoints and detailed evaluation questions • Science and innovation policy / • Development of research and innovation system • What has been the relevance of the CoE policy for Finnish research and innovation system? • How should the CoE programme be developed in the future? • Universities and research institutes • Have universities modified their strategies due to CoE policy? • Have host organisations invested in the research infrastructure? • Exit strategies of the host organisations for the units after the programme funding? • Utilisers of knowledge and the collaborators of CoE • What kind of cooperation of basic and applied research and cooperation between researchers and users of knowledge the programme has promoted? • How have research results been utilised and what kind of possibilities are there for their utilisation in the future? • How have the PhDs educated in the units been placed in the working life? Centres of Excellence What kind of added value have CoE policy and CoE programmes given to the research activity of the units? CoE programmes 7

8. Implementation of the evaluation by Gaia Consulting Ltd June – December 2008

9. CoE programmes have had positive impacts on research – increased opportunities for free research and increased critical mass for research

10. Impacts of CoE programme on research funding • There is no evidence of concentration of public funding to CoEs • The CoE status and funding have affected positively on getting other competitive funding, but the impact is not considered to be permanent • The most significant impact is seen to be due to an opportunity to have long term funding and more freedom in using the funding • The shares of CoE funding of all research funding in CoEs have been 12% and 16% for the two terms. • For an individual CoE, the share of CoE funding has varied between 4% and 51% of their total funding

11. The host organisations can benefit from the CoE programmes in many ways

12. Top level research creates impacts in society 2.

13. Conclusions and recommendationsFinnish CoE programmes have been successful • Finnish CoE programmes should be continued • Overall, the CoE programme has been a success and majority of the survey respondents, interviewees, and workshop participants think that Finland needs to continue with an active CoE policy. 2. Also in the future the main selection criterion for the CoEs should be the scientific quality • The significance of the societal impact of research will increase in the future and thus it should be clearly taken into account by other means. 3. A strategic choice should be made between the weights of 1) further strengthening the top-level units and 2) improving the conditions of the ones that aim at being top-level units • The two programme periods have included CoEs in different development stages => One programme does not serve all of the needs

14. Research infrastructures and researcher career development opportunities are preconditions for top-level research 4. To improve the conditions of top-level research, the research infrastructure policy and research careers should be developed nationally • The CoE policy should sought for synergies wirth the roadmap work of the national research infrastructure in fields of experimental research. 5. Roles of the host organisations should be more significant and more active in the future • The host organisations will be the most important strategic partners of the CoEs. • The universities cannot be committed to support all the units that want to be CoEs.

15. Key areas of improvement for the future CoE programmes 6. The future programmes should aim at smaller number of Centres of Excellence with more extensive public funding per unit 7. Termination of the CoE’sprogramme term should be better designed and considered 8. Added value of the programmatic approach should be better utilised in the CoEprogrammes 9. As part of the CoEprogrammes the daily procedures for the CoE research management and administration should be developed

16. Next steps • Revised guidelines for the CoE programmes to be written in autumn 2009 • Definitionof a CoE • Funding level of the CoEs • Funding period • Evaluation and selection criteria • Weighting of social / economical / technological impacts in a selection process • …. • A call for proposals of the programme starting in 2012 to be launched in 2010

17. More information • Director, Dr Ritva Dammert Ritva.Dammert@aka.fi www.aka.fi / eng > Science in society > Centres of excellence • Managing Director, Dr Mari Hjelt Mari.Hjelt@gaia.fi www.gaia.fi

18. THANK YOU!