Evaluation of the Canada Excellence Research Chairs (CERC) Program

Launched in 2008, the Canada Excellence Research Chairs (CERC) Program supports Canadian universities in building a critical mass of expertise targeted within the four priority research areas of the Government of Canada’s Science & Technology (S&T) Strategy, in support of Canada’s growing reputation as a global leader in research and innovation. As a tri-agency initiative of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), the Program is administered by the Chairs Secretariat, housed within SSHRC.

The evaluation of the CERC Program was conducted by SSHRC in collaboration with Science-Metrix and covered the initial five years of the Program, from inception in 2008/09 to 2013/14 (the end of phase 1 of the second competition). The evaluation addressed key questions of relevance, performance and efficiency, in accordance with section 42.1 of the Financial Administration Act and the Treasury Board Policy on Evaluation (2009).

Read the Evaluation Report: [HTML]

Read the Management Response: [HTML]

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