Research Excellence

The University creates and advances knowledge and understanding, and improves the quality of life through the discovery, dissemination, and application of research within and across disciplines.

Research is to see what everybody else has seen and to think what nobody else has thought.
Albert Szent-Györgyi

UBC is responsible for a quarter of all research conducted in British Columbia. Our strengths—including our interdisciplinary approach, commercialization record, and distributed medical program—point the way forward. Our challenge lies in asking ourselves again: How may we best think what nobody else has thought?

Emerging areas of research excellence at UBC reflect some of the world’s most insistent themes in science, technology, social sciences, and the humanities. Finding answers to questions in these and all fields lies in improving the conditions for discovery: Increased knowledge exchange. Partnerships both local and global. A resilient infrastructure grounded in freedom and responsibility.

UBC’s research excellence is a key economic driver, a draw for the world’s greatest minds, and an impetus for societal transformation—all that the University’s founders foresaw. We must now think what even they did not, and become more.

Goal Increase the quality and impact of UBC’s research and scholarship

Support and enhance UBC researchers’ grant funding competitiveness and success

• Continue to increase success rate and funding for tri-council programs at both campuses, especially team-based, partnership and strategic grants competitions, using SPARC office expertise and VPRI resources. Improve UBC’s leadership position in tri-council program funding. (VPRI, DVC)
• Increase funding support from foundation, international and non-traditional funding sources (VPRI, VPDAE, DVC)
• Work with partners to develop a provincial Research Strategy starting with a focus on health research (VPRI, DVC, VPA)

Enhance infrastructure to support leading edge research

• Support the development of all CFI proposals to achieve the highest success rate as a fraction of our competition funding cap (VPRI)
• Build the BC Integrated Research Library (VPA)

Foster UBC’s globally influential areas of research excellence

• Focus resources on areas of research excellence and strategic priorities. Examples: CRC recruitment and CRC competition (VPRI, DVC)
• Develop and prioritize research partnerships with local community organizations that address key emerging issues in the Okanagan (DVC)
• Develop new global centres of excellence at UBC with international partners. For example, Max Planck Centres, Fraunhofer Institutes and the Canadian International Institute for Extractive Industries and Development (VPRI, VPA, DVC)
• Launch UBC “School of Governance”* and the Vancouver School of Economics (VPA) * NOTE: name to be confirmed

Collaborate with faculties to measure research outputs and impact

• Develop a UBC research impact framework and annual research impact report card in collaboration with each Faculty and provide adequate resources to allow us to support the collection of rigorous and relevant research impact metrics (VPRI, DVC)

Expand recruitment and retention of top ranked graduate students and postdoctoral fellows

• Complete a review of the funding landscape and make a recommendation regarding guaranteed funding packages, as part of an overall assessment of time-to-completion
• Develop new tools to enhance graduate student recruitment

Goal Be a world leader in knowledge exchange and mobilization

Increase the impact of UBC research through strengthened knowledge mobilization capacity and effectiveness (technology transfer, technology mobilization and knowledge transfer)

• Increase the number of technology mobilization channels (i.e. open source, apps, patent pools) and facilitate their adoption and use (VPRI, DVC)
• Create knowledge translation support programs for UBC researchers in collaboration with research funders (VPRI, DVC)
• Partner nationally to access/develop meaningful metrics to measure knowledge mobilization (VPRI, DVC)

Facilitate access of UBC personnel and alumni to entrepreneurship programs

• Increase the number of new ventures accessing entrepreneurship@UBC services by 20% (VPRI)
• Increase the number of individuals accessing support through entrepreneurship@UBC

Facilitate engagement of external communities in research and graduate training at UBC

• Develop three new partnerships related to the University as a Living Laboratory (VPRI, DVC)
• Continue to develop strategic linkages at the Okanagan campus with partners around sustainability water, wine and technology industries (DVC)
• Expand the successfully launched Peter Wall Solutions Initiative, in collaboration with the Wall Trustees (VPRI, DVC, VPA)
• Develop a cross-campus Industry Engagement Strategy (VPRI, DVC, VPA)

Develop a system for making UBC research accessible in digital repositories, especially open access repositories

• Draft statement of Open Access principles, for consideration by UBC Scholarly Communications committee (2012) (VPRI, DVC, VPA)
• Collaborate with the Library to develop a strategy for digital repositories (VPRI, VPA)
• Facilitate deliberations of the working group on scholarly publications and data repository (VPRI, VPA, DVC)