HEFCE today revealed to the public the funding allocations based on the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise. Thanks to a significantly improved result in the recent RAE, as well as an expansion of its research base since 2001, University of Lincoln will see its funding increase to £1.9 million per annum from 2009-2010. This is up from around £265K in previous years.

The full breakdown of results is available on the Times Higher Education website. The story draws attention to the fact that HEFCE have kept their word to “fund excellence wherever it is found”, rather than simply concentrating research funding in the top 20 institutions. In fact, the Times Higher article picks out Lincoln as one of a group of “teaching-led” universities which have seen funding increase substantially:

Examples of teaching-led institutions that have won cash at the expense of research-intensive universities include: Edge Hill University, which saw its total research funding rise from £1,222 to nearly £403,000; the University of Lincoln, the funding for which has spiralled from £266,000 to £1.9 million; and London Metropolitan University, which received £768,000 in 2008-09 but nets more than £3.4 million this time around.

Lincoln’s change in total funding from RAE 2001 to 2008 amounts to an increase of 628% according to the Times Higher funding allocation table. This puts Lincoln very near the top of the table in terms of percentage change in funding – one of the most improved institutions.

The Quality Related (QR) portion of the total funding (i.e. funding determined solely by the RAE results) will top £1.6M per annum. This is an increase from zero after the last RAE, and Lincoln has in fact received the most QR funding of those institutions which are newly-funded this time round. This is an outstanding performance which is testament to the efforts of staff across the institution.

The rest of the £1.9M is made up of charity support funding (£7K), research degrees supervision funding (£295K), and a QR business research element (£26K).