The Tertiary Education Commission (TEC) is currently in the implementation phase of standing up the TREF. We will publish detailed guidance for each component once the operational settings for each have been finalised.

Research Degree Completions

The Research Degree Completions component recognises research-led teaching and development of the research workforce.

The TEC will allocate funding based on the proportion of research-based postgraduate degrees completed at participating tertiary education organisations (TEOs), weighted by:

• research volumes
• relative costs of the subject areas, and
• any equity or strategic weightings.

The Research Degree Completions component is used to allocate 30 percent of the Fund.

External Research Income

The External Research Income (ERI) component recognises and rewards TEOs that are successful at attracting research funding from external sources. Eligible ERI comes from the following sources, which are weighted by the TEC:

• Aotearoa New Zealand government contestable funds – weighted 1
• Aotearoa New Zealand public sector contract research – weighted 1
• Aotearoa New Zealand non-government income – weighted 6
• Overseas research income – weighted 3.5.

The ERI component is used to allocate 25 percent of the Fund.

Field-Weighted Citation Measure

The Field-Weighted Citation Measure (FWCM) component recognises and rewards the quality, relevance and intensity of research activity. It is intended to measure the impact of publications, calculated at an organisational level, and will be calculated based on a research output and citations database/s, chosen by the TEC.

The FWCM component is used to allocate 30 percent of the Fund.

Commercialisation

The Commercialisation component measures and rewards activity leading to research commercialisation, and recognises commercialisation activities within universities. It aims to both incentivise research capable of being commercialised and support activity leading to commercialisation of that research.

The TEC will allocate this component based on data supplied by participating TEOs to the Ministry for Business, Innovation and Employment under its Commercialisation Outcomes Measurement Framework.

The Commercialisation component is used to allocate 7.5 percent of the Fund.

The operational settings for this component have been finalised and guidance for eligible TEOs can be found in the following document:

Tertiary Research Excellence Fund: Commercialisation component (PDF 824 KB) 

Policy Impact

The Policy Impact component measures the impact of academic publications on public policy.

It will measure research output citations in policy documents, such as those produced by local and national government agencies and New Zealand-based and international organisations. Policy impact will be calculated based on a research output and citations database chosen by the TEC.

The Policy Impact component is used to allocate 5 percent of the Fund.

Research Capacity

The Research Capacity component reflects TEOs’ investment in research capacity and incentivises them to grow their research capability. It applies to eligible polytechnics, wānanga and PTEs unless they have chosen to opt in to the allocation method applied to universities.

This component will require participating TEOs to report to TEC the proportion of contracted and/or committed time that eligible academic staff spend on research and/or knowledge exchange.

The Research Capacity component is used to allocate 2.5 percent of the Fund.

More information

For more information, please contact the TREF Team at TREF.Help@tec.govt.nz