Last week, more than 100 university presidents/vice chancellors from the Asia-Pacific region attended the (SDSN) President's meeting, chaired by Prof. Jeffery Sachs.
A common theme of the discussion was how universities can to deepen engagement with the UN system to advance the SDGs. Many Presidents spoke on the need for universities to accelerate efforts for collaborative science to solve wicked problems during this time of crisis in the pursuit of open science, evidence-informed policymaking, and fighting misinformation.??
We know that we all need to move faster and do more if we are to achieve the SDGs by 2030. But how? A common challenge facing many universities and researchers is how they can grow the kinds of large-scale, multi-partner interdisciplinary research initiatives that can make a material impact on the SDGs??
In response to this challenge a “” has just been published. The Framework draws from an 18 month study of challenge-led, large scale research at Monash University. It codifies their experience across 12 case studies spanning 15 years and over AU$1 billion of research investment involving approximately 1,200 researchers from more than 40 academic institutions.?
The Framework aims to expand mission-oriented research and innovation initiatives within university settings. It includes seven interconnected elements that provide the fundamental building blocks of what successful strategies and tactics to catalyse large-scale, challenge-led research initiatives. The seven elements include: (1) research excellence and impact; (2) transformational leadership; (3) external partnerships and consortia; (4) an entrepreneurial spirit; (5) institutional supports and innovation; (6) tiger teams to deliver; and (7) thinking and working politically.
The Framework seeks to strengthen systems, cultures and capabilities — at a range of levels — for responsibly growing university-led research missions. Furthermore, the Framework offers a typological schema that categorises mission-oriented endeavours into four main types — discovery, practice, policy and community — reflecting there is no ‘one size fits all’, with a diversity of drivers aligned with the specific nature of the problems and potential solutions evident.
The International Science Council (ISC) is exploring mission-oriented models for activating research at scale. It calls on universities and researchers to do more: “Achieving the transformative vision of the SDGs by 2030 requires an urgent realignment of most countries’ and actors’ priorities and resources towards longer-term, more collaborative, and drastically accelerated action. It also requires game-changing collective action within science systems and funding globally.”
Drawing from , missions are characterised by their bold ambition, problem-driven and solutions-oriented focus, and explicit, time-bound impact goals, undertaken through deep, sustained partnerships with academic and non-academic stakeholders. This paradigm, often referred to as ‘challenge-led’ or ‘mission-oriented’ research, prioritises ambitious goals aimed at tackling significant societal challenges such as mitigating and adapting to climate change, reversing biodiversity loss, addressing illness and disease, and reducing poverty and inequalities.
Most scholarship and practice on mission-oriented innovation has focused on government-led missions and industrial policy. This Framework fills a gap in scholarship and guidance on the roles of universities and their researchers in catalysing and stewarding mission-oriented initiatives.
This Framework can support researchers, university administrators, and research funders embarking on SDG-aligned research and innovation endeavours.
Some of the research initiatives upon which the Framework is based on include: the working with communities to fight against mosquito-borne disease; the project providing heat-stable intramuscular medication to reduce post postpartum haemorrhage and childbirth mortality; the (RISE) program that is co-designing water and sanitation infrastructure with communities in Indonesia and Fiji to address pressing water and sanitation infrastructure to improve human and environmental health; and (SAEF) which is improving our understanding of the role of Antarctica on the world’s weather systems and climate change.
University research has much to offer the SDGs through their knowledge, resources, convening power and influence. Through strategic coordination and collaboration, universities can harness the collective expertise of researchers, educators, students, policymakers, and industry and community partners, to address pressing societal issues underpinned by rigour and research excellence, and as anchor institutions in the geographies and networks in which they are located.
The Report and Framework is available for download here:
Dr Matthew A. French is the Senior Director, Research Missions and Impact in the portfolio of the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research) and Senior Vice-President at Monash University. He is also Associate Professor in Monash’s Faculty of Art, Design and Architecture.
Lucy Donaldson is Project Manager, Research Missions and Impact in the portfolio of the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research) and Senior Vice-President at Monash University.
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