Significant progress has been done on our Research and Innovation dimension from the R&I experts of the YUFE Alliance. Our work was presented during the Annual Progress Meeting of our YUFERING project, which took place on 11th and 12th of May 2023 at the University of Cyprus. The YUFERING project started in March 2021 and will be completed in February 2024, having less than one year left for completion. It is coordinated by the University of Cyprus and the consortium includes the YUFE Alliance academic institutions.

In the 2023 Annual Progress meeting a series of internal and external meetings and events took place. We presented our progress to our Advisory Board on Thursday, 11th of May, which comprises Vice-Rectors of R&I and R&I decision-makers from the YUFE institutions and is chaired by the Vice rector of Academic Affairs of the University of Cyprus. The YUFERING Advisory Board was updated for each work area of the project and provided recommendations to the Management Committee of YUFERING, particularly on upcoming training programmes that will be open to all YUFE institutions.

Presenters:

  • Management and Coordination – Dr. Marios Demetriades (University of Cyprus)
  • Community-Engaged Research and Innovation – Dr. Ronit-Shiri Sverdlov (Maastricht University)
  • Flipped Knowledge Transfer – Barbara Tan (University of Antwerp)
  • Recognition, Reward, and Circulation of Researchers – Charlotte Simmat (University of Bremen)
  • Open Science – Dr. Eva Méndez (University Charles III of Madrid)
  • Dissemination, Exploitation and Communication – Elena Christodoulou (University of Cyprus)

Our work, however, has not stayed within our circle. On Friday 12th of May we invited stakeholders from our research and innovation ecosystem to our physical stakeholder info day at the University of Cyprus. The event has brought over 40 individuals together to hear about our transformation areas and latest developments in research assessment. Academics and R&I experts from local universities, research centres and the broader community attended this event, posed questions to the project coordinators and had the opportunity to network at the end of the event.

The event started with a welcoming by the Rector of the University of Cyprus, Professor Tasos Christofides, and the Vice-Rector for Academic Affairs, Professor Tatiana-Eleni Synodinou who presented to the community the value of the YUFERING project. Examples were given on how the YUFERING project provides value at the institutional, alliance, and local community level on the areas of community engaged research and innovation, flipped knowledge transfer, recognition, regard and circulation of talents, and open science.

The leader of the transformation area “Flipped Knowledge Transfer”, Barbara Tan (University of Antwerp) has set the scene for the quadruple helix and outlined what is needed to adopt a flipped knowledge transfer approach. Barbara Tan has also summarised the results from the SWOT and gap analysis that were conducted in this project, showing the challenges that institutions can face when adopting the flipped knowledge transfer approach. Finally, she has talked about the latest report published on the “Profile of Knowledge Transfer Managers”.

The latest development in the YUFERING project in “Recognition, Reward, and Circulation of Talents” has been our report on “The YUFE Competence Framework for Researchers” was presented by the transformation area leader Charlotte Simmat (University of Bremen). The Framework can support academic staff development programmes, staff selection and promotion, and individual career planning. Based on existing frameworks at each institution, and following discussions on the European level regarding researchers’ competences, a list of 17 competences and behaviours were identified.

From our experience in this project, we have highlighted the R&I challenges that were faced by the YUFE Alliance, along with policy recommendations, in a Policy Brief that was sent to the European Commission in August 2022 to the European Commission. Dr. Marios Demetriades presented to the audience the challenges tackled, along with recommendations on policy areas such as Facilitating Transnational Cooperation, Strengthening Careers, Digital Transition, Access to Excellence, and Increasing Global Competitiveness.

The latest development in research assessment were also presented. Dr Marios Demetriades gave a presentation on the Coalition for Advancing Research Assessment (CoARA), specifically on the process, the commitments it entails, and what the University of Cyprus has done so far.