REF 2029 Strategy, People and Research Environment

The research environment element familiar from REF 2021 has been renamed ‘Strategy, People and Research Environment (SPRE)’ and its weighting has been increased to 20%.

There is a significant attempt to reduce the burden of the exercise through reverting to the environment statement template from REF 2021 for both institution and unit-level statements.

Institutions and UoAs are required to demonstrate their clear strategic intent and how their strategies contribute toward the development of people and good research environments. This will be done primarily through narrative with metrics to support.

The major changes are:

• The underpinning focus on strategy and institutional research infrastructure (ie: systems and policies that support research);
• A greater focus on research culture and evidence of improving culture metrics;
• New partnerships, collaborations and policies.

SPRE will be assessed at both institutional and UoA level

The SPRE element will consist of an institution-level statement (ILS, weighting 60% of the SPRE score) and a unit-level statement (ULS, 40%).

The two statements will be assessed separately and both statements will comprise the four sections equivalent to the UL environment statement from REF 2021.  In addition to the ILS and ULS there will be data requirements at both levels:

SPRE (20% of overall UoA Quality Profile)

For further information please see the SPRE REF guidance module.