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SRA News
For past news items - please see the News Archive News Professor Sir Roger Jowell CBE Roger combined a passion for quality social science with a keen concern that social science should be useful to policymakers and practitioners and he understood that to be effective, social researchers needed to have a strong professional organisation. He was the joint founder, in 1969, of Social and Community Planning Research [SCPR, which became the National Centre for Social Research in 1999), an organisation which has played a pivotal role in the development of high quality social research in the UK. Indeed through SCPR /NatCen’s uncompromising commitment to high quality social research many of us would argue that Roger made a greater contribution to the conduct of quality social research in the UK than any other single individual. And this was crucial in demonstrating what good quality research could do for government. Roger was also a key player in the professional development of social research and researchers. He was the initiator and major contributor to the establishment of the Social Research Association in 1978 and gave it his continued support until his death. He took the lead in the SRA‘s early work on developing the ethical guidelines for social research which has been so influential in British social science. He also played a leading role in the SRA’s work to improve the quality of social research commissioning by helping to draft the organisation’s Good Practice Guidelines and subsequent activities to take them forward. Two major achievements among the many social research projects with which he was involved were the establishment of the British Social Attitudes survey in 1983 which he started and directed, editing its first 19 annual reports and secondly in 2001 co-founding and directing the European Social Survey, a 34-nation comparative study of changing social values throughout Europe. This was awarded the prestigious European Descartes Prize in 2005. Roger became a Research Professor at City University in 2003 where he set up the Centre for Comparative Social Surveys. He held many posts on committees throughout his working life including most recently Deputy Chair of the UK Statistics Authority and continued to write and lecture widely on social research matters. Roger’s influence on several generations of social researchers in the UK and Europe and on the development of the social survey as a vehicle of enquiry contributing to better evidenced policy making has been profound. For many of us he embodied all that was best about being a social researcher. He was very widely respected and deeply loved and will be very sorely missed by his professional friends and colleagues. We send all our sympathy and condolences to his family and friends. Press Release SRA Joins Campaign For Social Science The SRA is joining with the Academy of Social Sciences and other learned societies in the social sciences to campaign for social science and the contribution it makes to improving overall social well being. For further details, click here. SRA e-Bulletin Recorded Presentations
from the 4th ESRC Methods Festival now available The recordings include:
The 5th ESRC Research Methods Festival takes place on 2-5 July 2012, once again at St Catherine's College in Oxford. Details of the festival will be publicised, nearer the time, in the National Centre for Research Methods website http://www.ncrm.ac.uk Arrangements for ‘Supporting Social
Science in Government’ AMS review of UK medical research regulation and governance SRA Article on Research Commissioning - August 2010 The SRA has had a long-standing interest in the way research is commissioned starting with a conference entitled Can you buy it off the shelf? Alternative methods of commissioning research, the proceedings of which were published by the SRA in January 1985. Ten years later, in 1994, a Good Practice Guide on Commissioning social research was published and a revised version was produced in November 2002. This guide gives practical advice on issues relating to commissioning research, including different types of competition, running competitive tenders, and ways in which research buyers and suppliers can best work together. Click here to download a copy (.pdf 225k) of the current good practice guide to commissioning social research. Some sections of the guide, such as some of the EU requirements, are now out of date and the SRA is planning an update. But the fundamental principles of what constitutes `good practice’ in commissioning remain the same. In 2004 the SRA decided to take forward some further work on commissioning and an Initiative was set up, aimed at improving practice as a contribution to improving the quality of research that is carried out. The Initiative is run on the basis of a mailing list of interested people who are invited to one or two meetings a year to discuss different issues relating to commissioning. The main focus has been on providing well-grounded information to commissioners about good practice and on the development of training on commissioning. Two early successes were:
A wide range of other topics have also been discussed including the Alcatel judgement, reverse auctions, the implications of the shift to full economic costs for university research, EU definitions of research, and issues concerning VAT and research. A note giving more details of the Initiative’s work can be downloaded here (doc 20k). Over the last couple of years there have been a number of discussions about Framework Agreements, to understand more about the way they operated in practice and the pros and cons of this method of commissioning. Members of the Initiative commented on a draft of the GSRU’s Framework Agreement guidance for Government Social Research. The final version, produced in 2009, is available here , incorporated some of the Group’s suggestions. The information in the Guidance is largely based on Office of Government Commerce (OGC) guidance, though discussions were also held with a small number of research and procurement staff in departments. The SRA felt there was a need to build on this work by carrying out a small piece of research to examine the procurement of social research in government including a comparison of organisations using different Framework Agreements and more traditional project-based methods. Funding was successfully obtained from the Nuffield Foundation at the end of 2009, for which the SRA is most grateful. Following a competitive process, Carol Goldstone Associates were appointed to carry out the work which is due for completion in November 2010. Details of the project can be downloaded here (doc 47k). Anyone interested in joining the Initiative’s mailing list and attending meetings should contact Janet Lewis, via the SRA office. Careers in Social Research: Insights from, and aspirations of,
students attending the
Careers Event hosted by SRA Scotland and University of Strathclyde Latest Guidance From The National Statistician For latest guidance from the National Statistician for statisticians and other officials in implementing the principles of the Code of Practice for Official Statistics click here. Social Research Skills and Competency Framework The SRA established a working party in to develop a competency framework to identify the varying levels research skills and competency required for different levels of responsibility within social research and related organisations. The working party has now produced a framework (doc 60k). There is also an short report (doc 52k) to introduce and explain the rationale for the framework. Large Demographic Datasets now available Free of Charge to Non Profit Organisations The Individual SARs and SAM are now available free of charge to not-for-profit organisations, including Local Authorities, Health Authorities, Central Government and charities. More information can be found at http://sars.census.ac.uk |
