Several universities are being threatened with tough penalties for allegedly providing data that would artificially boost their performance on prestigious research rankings used to allocate government funding.
 

Fairfax Media understands the Australian Research Council has written stern letters to several universities warning them they face punishments for providing misleading data for their research excellence assessments.

The council warned universities earlier this year that it would take the provision of any false or misleading information seriously, and that serious offences could be prosecuted under Commonwealth law.

The Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA) report evaluates the research performance of universities in various academic disciplines, assigning them a score from one to five. Those with the lowest scores are judged to have research well below world standard, while those with the highest scores are judged to be among the best in the world.

The results are used to help allocate about $120 million in government research grants each year and universities spruik their results to demonstrate their prowess in certain research fields.

The Australian Research Council has written to several universities informing them they could be given a blank score - essentially a score of zero out of five - for providing inaccurate and misleading information.

If the council carries out the threat, it would be a major embarrassment for the institutions in question and could lead to reduced government funding.

Fairfax Media understands the University of Tasmania and Central Queensland University are among those institutions that have been contacted by the council.

It is understood the concerns relate to the same journal articles being "coded" multiple times, which could inflate a university's results.

Sources suggested concerns might have been raised with up to nine institutions.
 

It is understood that none of the elite sandstone universities, which tend to receive the highest ERA results, have been contacted.

Sources said the ERA process was complex and had many "grey areas", but the research council wanted to discourage universities from attempting to "game the system".
 

The move comes as the Turnbull government prepares to overhaul the way university research is funded to reduce the importance of publishing in academic journals.
 

Asked about the allegations, Australian Research Council chief executive Aidan Byrne said: "The ERA process is not yet complete.
 

"There is work ongoing in completing material for ERA 2015 and it would be inappropriate for the ARC to make comments or speculate when that process is not complete."

The 2015 ERA results are due for release in December.

A spokesman for Central Queensland University declined to answer questions, referring comment to the Australian Research Council.

University of Tasmania deputy vice-chancellor (research) Brigid Heywood said: "We understand that the ERA assessment process is still under way and it would therefore not be appropriate to comment further."

Following the publication of this story, the ARC released a statement saying that neither of the universities named in the article had "coded" journal articles "multiple times" to "inflate a university's results".


"It is not fair that two particular universities have been named," the statement reads. "I am concerned that assumptions may be made about these two universities that are not factual.


"The ARC maintains it would be inappropriate to comment when a process is ongoing and still to be finalised, i.e. via release of the national report. However, I would like to advise - in an effort to cease speculation - that there can be many and varied reasons why data is queried and it should never be assumed this is about gaming or misconduct by a university."

Sourced from: http://www.smh.com.au/national/education/universities-questioned-over-alleged-gaming-of-research-rankings-20151117-gl0yva.html