Academic Research: From Theory to Practice (Analysis Focused on the Seventh Progress Plan)

In this article, the important issue of academic research is discussed and analyzed from the social impact base. The analysis, judgment, and suggestions of this research are bound by the quantitative and qualitative objectives stated in Chapter 20 of the Seventh Progress Plan Law.
The article is organized in two parts. The first part includes general and theoretical considerations that include a look at the research background, review, and extraction of relevant cases from the Seventh Progress Plan Law.
The second part of the article reviews and analyzes academic research from the perspective of application and social impact. Suggestions are made for further biasing academic research towards responding to social needs. A very important point is that the Seventh Progress Plan emphasizes on the one hand maintaining (and improving) Iran’s scientific rank at the international level and also achieving scientific authority at the regional level; on the other hand, it calls for conducting directional and demand-driven research. As a result, in accordance with the quantitative and qualitative goals of the Seventh Progress Plan, a balance should be established between theoretical research, the orientation of which is to maintain the scientific rank of 14 on an international scale, and applied research, the orientation of which is to commercialize the results of research. The present study attempts to make suggestions to simultaneously meet both basic goals.
In addition, an attempt has been made to ensure that the proposed implementation mechanism is more focused on the field realities of higher education in the country than on theoretical theorizing. Accordingly, the present study proposes adopting a policy that is known as the T model in the education sector, and the “theory and practice in academic research” approach in the research sector.