Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA) Initiative

About the ERA

In 2008, the Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research, the Hon. Senator Kim Carr, announced the release of a new research quality and evaluation framework initiative.

The Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA) initiative is developed and managed by the Australian Research Council (ARC) as a major funder of public sector research. It assesses research quality within Australia's Higher education institutions using a combination of indicators and expert review by committees comprising experienced, internationally recognised experts.

The Research Excellence website contains relevant and up-to-date information about the ERA Initiative including the Australian and New Zealand Standard Research Classifications (ANZSRC) Field of Research (FOR) codes and FAQ's.

ERA is broken up into the following discipline specific clusters:

1. Physical, Chemical and Earth Sciences (PCE)
2. Humanities and Creative Arts (HCA)
3. Engineering and Environmental Sciences (EE)
4. Education and Human Society (EHS)
5. Mathematics, Information and Computing Sciences (MIC)
6. Biological and Biotechnological Sciences (BB)
7. Medical and Health Sciences (MHS)
8. Economics and Commerce (EC)

In 2010, CQUniversity participated in the full ERA process and submitted research data for all eight clusters.  Results for this data collection have been released and can be viewed at the ARC website.

The ARC has announced the next round of ERA will occur in 2012. 

The submission phase will commence in March 2012.

ERA 2012 Reference Periods: 

Researcher eligibility is based on a single staff census date, which is 31 March 2011.

Policies and Formal Documents

• ERA 2012 Guidelines
• ERA 2012 Technical Specification
• ERA 2012 Discipline Matrix
• Fields of Research 

Esteem Measures

• Information Sheet about Esteem Measures
• Editor of a Prestigious Work of Reference
• Fellowship of Learned Academy and Membership of AIATSIS
• Membership of a Statutory Committee
• Recipient of a Nationally Competitive Research Fellowship
• Recipient of an Australian Council Grant or Australian Council Fellowship  

Journal Rankings

The ARC is consulting with the higher education sector regarding research outlet rankings for the ERA intitiative. Please note: the ARC will not be updating this list with current publications or rankings. 

• ERA - Final Journal List 2010
• ERA - Full Journal List - Trial 2009
• PCE Ranked Journal List - Trial 2009
• HCA Ranked Journal LIst - Trial 2009 

Conference Rankings

• ERA- Final Ranked Conference List 2010