UWERTURA

UWERTURA CALL FOR PROPOSALS for fellowships in international research teams conducting ERC grants

The UWERTURA call for proposals for fellowships in international research teams conducting ERC grants is targeted at researchers who plan to apply for a research grant to the European Research Council (ERC).

The objective of the call for proposals is to provide support to researchers conducting research at Polish research institutions with respect to the effective application for European funds and to increase their share in the group of ERC grantees. Fellowships in research teams conducting research financed with ERC grants will boost the academic profile of candidates applying for ERC grants, giving them an opportunity to acquire knowledge and indispensable experience in the international grant system. The call for proposals is organised in agreement with the ERC within the Fellowship Schemes to Visit ERC Grantees.

Conditions for submitting a proposal:

1. Proposals for fellowship candidates can be submitted by Polish research institutions, i.e. universities, research institutions of the Polish Academy of Sciences and other research institutes, as well as international research institutes.

2. To be eligible for the fellowship, the candidate must:

• have at least a doctoral degree;
• be employed on the basis of an employment contract by the research institution;
• have conducted a research project funded within NCN schemes as a principal investigator;
• not be or have been ERC grantees;
• act as a principal investigator applying to the ERC for a grant.

3. Proposals are eligible if the applicant:

• submits a description of a research project in which the fellowship candidate acts as the principal investigator in an ERC funding scheme.
• plans a fellowship[1] lasting from 3 to 6 months for the person designated in the proposal in a selected international research team conducting research financed with an ERC grant.
• indicates an ERC grantee acting as a host for the fellow and submits a document confirming consent of the grantee and the research institution where the research funded by ERC is being conducted to host the fellowship of candidate;
• obliges the fellowship candidate to submit, within 18 months from the fellowship completion, a proposal for an ERC grant to finance research planned to be conducted at a Polish research institution.

4. Proposals submitted in response to the call must involve frontier research in any of the research disciplines included in the list of NCN panels.

Grant:

1. The research institution will receive funds to finance the fellowship of the candidate, including the funds to cover the costs of their stay (PLN 15,000/month) and travel (from PLN 1,000 to PLN 10,000).

2. Failure to meet the fellow’s obligation to apply for an ERC grant within 18 months from the date of the fellowship’s completion will result in the requirement to return all of the funds awarded to the research institution in the call for proposals.

Procedure and deadline for proposal submission:

The proposal with required attachments must be submitted in the period from 15 December 2017 to 15 March 2018 electronically via the OSF (Financing Streams Handling) system available at the www.osf.opi.org.pl website.

Proposal evaluation:

1. The evaluation of proposals takes account of the following criteria:

• research achievements of the fellowship candidate;
• evaluation of the quality of research or tasks to be performed in the research project for which ERC funding will be requested, including innovative nature of the research project, its impact on the development of the discipline and evaluation of the feasibility of the proposed research;
• appropriate choice of the ERC grantee and the host institution for the fellowship.

2. Proposals are subject to an eligibility check and a peer review. Formal evaluation is carried out by the NCN Coordinators, while the peer review is conducted by the Expert Teams (appointed by the NCN Council), and external reviewers (appointed by the NCN Director).

3. Proposals undergo a double peer review:

• Stage I – Preliminary evaluation takes place on the basis of the information provided in the proposal with the attachments. It involves two separate reviews by two members of the Expert Team and is subsequently endorsed by the entire Expert Team. Proposals are qualified to the second stage of review on the basis of their position on the ranking list, with the reservation that the total amount of planned expenditures on the proposals qualified to the second stage cannot be higher than the double value of the funds allocated by the NCN Council to the call for proposals.
• Stage II – Specialist external evaluation takes place on the basis of the information provided in the proposal with the attachments. It involves individual evaluations made by reviewers who are not members of the Expert Team reviewing the proposal in Stage I and an interview in English with the candidate for the fellowship carried out by the Expert Team’s members. Subsequently, Expert Team members determine the final proposal evaluation on the basis of all individual reviews, interview results, analysis and a discussion of the proposals.

Financing:

The funds for fellowships qualified for financing are awarded to the research institution by way of a decision by the NCN Director, appealable against to the Appeal Committee of the NCN Council. 

Financial settlement:

The condition for the financial settlement of the fellowship is submission of an application for an ERC grant.

Supplementary provisions:

One person may be awarded financing in the UWERTURA funding scheme only once.

Allocated funds:

The NCN Council allocates PLN 5 million for UWERTURA call for proposals.

UWERTURA 2

CALL ANNOUNCEMENT: 15 December 2017

CALL DEADLINE: 15 March 2018

CALL RESULTS: 15 September 2018

CONTACT:

dr Ewelina Szymańska-Skolimowska

tel. +48 12 341 9155