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The relevance of the Universities of Applied Sciences (UASs) is growing in a world where practice-based learning and research are essential to meet societal development goals. Public policies for science, technology, and innovation must, therefore, account for an increasingly complex context where higher education institutions of varied shapes co-evolve. On the other hand, the increasing influence of international ranking systems and of bibliometric indicators calls for a critical revision of their adequacy to account for UASs ' key characteristics such as the importance of interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary approaches when tackling context-based challenges. This paper examines the roles of UASs in contemporary knowledge-intensive societies and critically addresses dominant research evaluation approaches. It is argued that i) qualitative approaches based on the visualization of bibliometric data can provide useful perspectives on interdisciplinarity, ii) the assessment of stakeholder engagement should be incorporated in rankings such as U-Multirank, and iii) knowledge dissemination at large could be assessed using Altmetrics indicators.
Keywords: universities of applied sciences, research assessment, professional doctorates, higher education rankings, bibliometrics, Altmetrics
INTRODUCTION
Higher education institutions (HEIs) act as "transformative institutions," contributing to socioeconomic regional development, the creation of social capital, and as educators for democratic and responsible citizenship (Gaisch et al., 2019). The creation of new knowledge through research is central to the fulfilment of these objectives (Meyer-Krahmer & Schmoch, 1998; Perkmann & Walsh, 2007). HEIs' research and development (R&D) activities also foster teaching excellence, which is essential for superior higher education and training. The transfer of knowledge to society occurs via different mechanisms, e.g., training of graduates, creation of enterprises, production of technical and scientific publications, and institutional cooperation. Thus, HEIs promote innovation activities through the combination of teaching, research, and knowledge valorization, and by playing an effective role in innovation ecosystems (Bramwell & Wolfe, 2008; Charles, 2006).
Practice-oriented HEIs, i.e., universities of applied sciences (UASs), were adopted in the 1960s and 1970s to reduce pressure on university admissions and also to enroll students who demanded higher education but did not intend to pursue a scientific career. The development of research in UASs, either by a policy drift or a practice drift, led to complex dynamics of differentiation and convergence with "classical" universities. Currently, most UASs develop research even though this is greatly influenced...