The report entitled “A study of academic evaluation in Uruguay in reflective perspective” was requested by the National Council for Innovation, Science and Technology (CONICYT); the results were presented on April 29 through a conference and two workshops held at the Faculty of Information and Communication of the University of the Republic.
Presentation of the report and workshops. April 29, 2024
The consultancy arose as a need within CONICYT from the materialization of the process of reflection and analysis aimed at a new institutional design of the STI area promoted by the Ministry of Education and Culture. Within this framework, it has been essential to diagnose the different evaluation systems for researchers and identify existing incentives and/or disincentives for developing scientific and technological activities. Thus, the tasks requested by CONICYT were: a) to systematize and analyze the researcher’s career evaluation experiences in Uruguay within the framework of current international debates and b) to prepare recommendations to improve and articulate the existing evaluation systems. Based on a public call for proposals, Dr. Fernanda Beigel was selected to head this consultancy, which was carried out in the context of CONICET’s consultancy framework.
For the development of the study, the reflective perspective of the Sociology of Evaluation was adopted, implementing a methodology that articulated qualitative and quantitative strategies, as well as a wide range of documentary material collected from all national institutions. To analyze the experience of the academic careers existing in Uruguay at different scales (institutional and national), interviews and focus groups were conducted with members of evaluation committees, officials, academic-scientific referents, and researchers. These testimonies were analyzed using Atlas.ti (see Part Two of this report). Likewise, the analysis of the relationship between the evaluation systems of researchers and the profiles of production and circulation of knowledge was carried out through an exploratory study of academic trajectories. Finally, based on the complete information on researchers in the National System of Researchers (SNI) existing in the Uruguayan Curriculum Vitae system (CVUy), a bibliometric analysis combined with prosopography was implemented to detect asymmetries and promotion problems in the SNI. With all the empirical material collected, the strengths and weaknesses of the researcher evaluation systems in Uruguay were identified, and a set of recommendations were proposed and included in the same study. The full report, its executive version, as well as the partial reports can be consulted at the following links: