Alice Pugh discusses the need for universities to improve how they measure and assess their civic and economic impact, particularly in relation to regional inequalities.
It critiques current impact assessments for being overly prescriptive and lacking a clear rationale, urging universities to integrate these assessments into strategic frameworks and develop more dynamic, locally contextualized evaluations to better reflect their unique contributions to society.
These findings were found by Alice Pugh, Johannes Read, Dr Sara Hassan, and Professor Rebecca Riley in a recent report on civic universities in collaboration with the NCIA.
Context
Civic universities are universities which are embedded within their local area, they are rooted within a town, city and/or city-region. Their names, histories, specialisms, were often developed in line with the geographical location within which they were founded. Universities make a significant civic and economic contribution to their locality, whether or not they adopt an explicit mission to generate local or regional impact.
In recent years there has been an increased in national policy focus towards universities in their places and addressing regional inequalities. As a result universities, as anchor institutions, have become a significant part of place-based discussions. Thus, it has become increasingly important for universities to demonstrate their civic and economic impacts.
Key questions
Currently, universities only measure their impact through economic impact assessments. However, these impact assessments are usually inconsistent and fail to capture the full picture of university impact. To improve impact assessments, we first need a greater understanding of:
- Why do universities conduct impact assessments?
- How do they use impact assessments to inform policy and strategy?
- What outputs do universities assess within their impact assessments?
Methodology
To understand how universities conduct their impact assessments we had to review a range of impact assessments, the steps to identifying the 20 university impact assessments that were analysis in this report can be seen in the figure below.
Identification of relevant University Impact Assessments
Analysis of the place-based economic impacts from the 20 assessments were captured using a data collection sheet. The data collection sheet was initially piloted by two reviewers independently before analysis of the full sample commenced. Throughout the analysis the data collection sheet operated as a living document. This enabled the coding of economic outputs into different themes.
Findings
Rationale for university impact assessments
Few of the reviewed impact assessments included a strong rationale for conducting an economic impact assessment. Often there was little explanation as to the purpose of the assessments and how the assessments would inform policy and strategy within the university or with local and regional stakeholders.
Outputs assessed within the impact assessment
The university outputs that were assessed and monetised within the impact assessments were largely economic in nature, with no civic element. Civic impacts, except geographical impacts, were only considered in the qualitative section of the impact assessments.
Additionally, the impact assessments failed to demonstrate the uniqueness of the individual institution. Largely the outputs assessed were prescriptive and descriptive, with very little demonstration of the impact that the universities aiming to achieve as an organisation. Based on the prescriptive nature of the outputs assessed within these impact assessments, it would appear that universities as an institution are not fully aware of neither the economic nor civic outputs they are producing and thus, unaware of the wider civic economic impact.
Summary
The purpose of this report was to understand how universities were currently measuring their civic economic impact. It was found that the university impact assessments are, currently, largely prescriptive and descriptive in nature. University impact assessments have the potential to demonstrate the unique impact of individual universities at both a civic and economic level, at present however, they are failing to demonstrate the civic.
Furthermore, universities should do more to embed their civic economic impact within their strategic framework and decision-making. Otherwise, there is a risk that the impact assessment is a static hollow document, when it should be utilised as an evidence base within their strategy and decision making for improving upon university civic economic agenda.
Going forward, undertaking economic impact assessments at a local level needs to be reframed as a dynamic, contextualised exercise that is part of the wider strategic decision-making process. Where universities set SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time-limited) civic economic objectives and outputs, these will be only achieved in collaboration with civic partner organisations in place.
We recommend:
- Reframing civic economic impact assessments as dynamic, contextualised and evaluative pieces of work. That provide an evidence based for the university civic mission, embedding these impact assessments within the university’s strategic framework and decision-making.
- Universities need to utilise the University Civic Economic Impact ROAMEF cycle (see figure below) to develop a robust and university specific rationale and objectives for university civic economic impact. Specifically developing their SMART objectives in partnership with civic and economic partners, to more accurately demonstrate their civic economic impact.
University Civic Economic Impact ROAMEF cycle
- Universities need to have a greater awareness of their own civic economic impact. To gain a better understanding of their civic economic impact, universities should be utilising the 12 Pillars of University Civic Economic Impact tool to map the civic and economic outputs that the university is producing. However, this needs to be an ongoing process and sufficient monitoring of the outputs needs to be developed, in order to effectively measure impact.
12 Pillars of University Civic Economic Impact
- Implementing civic economic impact assessments as part of an ongoing effort to improve universities’ civic role at a local, regional, national and global level. Universities should develop implementation plans with senior level ownership and accountability to action the findings arising from economic impact assessments.
Read the report in full.
This blog was written by Alice Pugh, Policy and Data Analyst City-REDI, University of Birmingham.
Disclaimer:
The views expressed in this analysis post are those of the author and not necessarily those of City-REDI or the University of Birmingham.