Teaching, Research and Academic Careers: An Analysis of the Interrelations and Impacts

This open-access book evaluates research quality, teaching quality, and the relationship between the two in Italy, comparing it to other European countries. It discusses whether university evaluation should consider multiple dimensions of research and takes into account the gender dimension in assessment. The book analyzes administrative data on career completion, precariousness of academic careers, research productivity, and interrelationships between students' achievements and teachers' careers. It highlights the low enrolment and completion rates in tertiary education in Italy compared to other countries.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 358 pages
Publication date: 13 August 2022
Publisher: Springer International Publishing AG

This open-access book evaluates research quality, quality of teaching, and the relationship between the two through sound statistical methods, and in a comparative perspective with other European countries. In so doing, it covers an increasingly important topic for universities that affects university funding. It discusses whether university evaluation should be limited to a single factor or consider multiple dimensions of research, since academic careers, teaching, and awarding degrees are intertwined. The chapters included in the book evaluate teaching and research, also taking the gender dimension into account, in order to understand where and when gender discrimination occurs in assessment. Divided into five sections, the book analyzes the administrative data on the determinants of career completion of university students; increasing precariousness of academic careers, especially of young researchers; methods designed to assess research productivity when co-authorship and team production are becoming the standard practice; and interrelationships between students' achievements and teachers' careers driven by research assessment. It brings together contributions from a large group of economists, statisticians, and social scientists working under a project sponsored by ANVUR, the Italian agency for the evaluation of teaching and research of academic institutions. From an international perspective, the findings in this book are particularly interesting because despite low tuition costs, tertiary education in Italy has relatively low enrolment rates and even lower completion rates compared to those in other European and American countries. This book is of interest to researchers of the sociology of education, education policy, public administration, economics, and statistics of education.

Weight: 557g
Dimension: 235 x 155 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9783031074400
Edition number: 1st ed. 2022