“There is a need for collegial feedback on our work”

Csanád Bodó, associate professor at the Faculty of Humanities of Eötvös Loránd University (ELTE), was the first in Hungary last year to receive funding from CoARA (Coalition for Advancing Research Assessment), which has more than 700 member institutions. The lecturers and doctoral students involved in the project worked out proposals in a participatory manner in 2025 to complement the Faculty’s metrics-based research assessment system, in line with the reform’s objectives. Interview.

When did you first hear about the qualitative reform of research assessment, and why did it seem interesting to you?
As with so many other things, it was my Finnish colleagues who first told me about CoARA and how it fits in with other similar initiatives. I was already familiar with the Leiden Manifesto and DORA, so my first question was whether, beyond the differences in emphasis, joining CoARA could bring a breakthrough in transforming research assessment. There is still no definite answer to this, but at the European level CoARA certainly has considerable influence. Thus, the expectation arises that the initiative might bring about systemic change. And change is needed because

prioritizing scientometrics, rankings and competition threatens to override the collaborative and open social dialogue–based role of research.

What was it like to apply for CoARA’s funding? How did the process unfold?
I actually have two kinds of experience with this. After we received the grant, I took part as an expert in evaluating the following year’s applications. Each proposal was assessed by at least three of us, and we reached consensus through online discussions. My experience of both applying and evaluating was positive not only because we were successful: the process was flexible enough for us to highlight key aspects of our own project, yet structured enough to make the diverse institutions and applications comparable with one another.

As a reviewer, my necessarily partial impression of the research assessment reform was that, in most institutions, the process is far more advanced than at ours. This is true for HEIs and research-support organisations in the East-Central European region as well. In contrast, at the Faculty of Humanities of ELTE we essentially took the very first steps with our project.

How was the workshop series structured?
It was important to us that the initiative to transform research assessment did not come from the top down. To this end, we modelled our workshop series, which was attended by 25 researchers including doctoral students, on the citizens’ jury format and called it részvételi tanácsolás (participatory counsel). We borrowed the Hungarian word tanácsolás from Moldavia, where villagers often

stop in the street or at the shop to “counsel”—that is, to simply talk a little with one another.

Our conversations, of course, were less spontaneous. Together with my colleagues experienced in participatory methods—Anna Hraskó, Hanna Opauszki and Gergely Szabó—we tried various ways to ensure that participants could openly share and debate their ideas about research assessment. We held a “language picnic” (Gergely Szabó has just published a book on this genre), and we tried methods like “six thinking hats” and “silent floor”. The three-day format was fixed: the first day focused on information, the second on deliberation, and the last on decision-making. The recommendations were also formulated on the third day.

Participants of the "részvételi tanácsolás" (participatory counsel) at the Faculty of Humanities, summer 2025

What were the most important conclusions?
It was an inspiring experience for me that, despite an academic culture that emphasizes individual performance, participants were open to applying CoARA principles that take into account the diversity of research careers. They also recognized the importance of peer review—not limited to assessing others’ manuscripts, but as a key source of feedback throughout a researcher’s career. They distinguished two types of research assessment. Drawing on a linguistic innovation of Ákos Teslár, head of ELTE’s Science Policy Office, who accompanied the process as an expert, we called these “selective” and “supportive” assessment.

According to this distinction, selective assessment concerns admission, promotion and rewards, whereas supportive research assessment focuses on how to conduct better research and how to become better researchers. Although their functions differ clearly, the planned transformation of current research assessment into qualitative peer assessment suggests that there should be no substantial difference in how they are carried out: evaluation should proceed largely according to the same criteria and in the same way—whether it concerns one’s own research, activities supporting the research community, the impact of one’s work, or individual factors such as changes in status or career transitions. Perhaps the most significant realisation of the participatory counsel was that

we need not only selective research assessment but also supportive peer assessment.

This can be seen as a collective response to the challenges researchers face in an increasingly individualised academic sphere.

The declared aim of the project was to prepare a package of recommendations for the Faculty leadership to review. What was the dean’s feedback like?
To ensure transparency, we published the participants’ recommendations on the project website in both Hungarian and English, along with the dean’s response. As dean, Dávid Bartus responded fundamentally positively to the initiative. What he considered difficult to implement was extending supportive research assessment to the entire research community at the Faculty of Humanities. His reasoning was that researchers are already heavily overburdened. Based on the experiences of our participatory counselling—about which I also had the chance to speak at the CoARA forum organised at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences—there is a need for collegial feedback on our own work. Putting this into practice can influence individual research careers in a way that

simultaneously contributes to one’s own work and to the practice of science based on collaboration, reciprocity and a supportive attitude.

What comes next?
To conclude the project, we planned a pilot study involving twelve researchers, integrating self-assessment and peer assessment within a common framework. The randomly selected participants first completed an online training that prepared them for qualitative self- and peer assessment. They then wrote a narrative CV according to the criteria mentioned above—that is, about their own research, their research community-supporting activities, the impact of their work, and further individual factors. Each self-assessment was evaluated anonymously and reciprocally by two participating researchers. The pilot will conclude in the end of 2025 with the participants’ reflective feedback. We will publish a report on our website early next year. In addition, we are considering how the project’s insights could be used at faculty or university level to deepen the qualitative reform of research assessment.