Applying for European Research Funding in the Humanities

Monday 5 December 11.00 -12.30 followed by lunch

One to one sessions available 14.00-16.00

Dr Giancarlo Pichillo

EU funding is a process. At its heart, you need a good team and a powerful network. Above all, you need a compelling idea. Innovativeness, originality, impact, research excellence, feasibility: no EU-funded proposal will lack these basic characteristics. This is a challenge that researchers and scholars engaged with social sciences and humanities need to tackle in order to let our disciplines survive in the current historical context.

Led by Dr Giancarlo Pichillo from the University of Sienna this session will specifically help you develop EU funding applications but also help you to construct better, more confident funding applications in general. Giancarlo has extensive experience of writing EU funding proposals (for example, Horizon 2020, FP7, Creative Europe etc) and project managing EU-funded projects. He is currently, the project manager of "Playing Identities, Performing Heritage", funded by the Creative Europe Programme (Small Scale Cultural Cooperation Projects), coordinated by the University of Siena.

If you are interested in attending the workshop and/or meeting Giancarlo for a one to one session, please contact Lynne Bennett.

Modern Balboas

Balboa. But not the Rocky one

Last week I gave a talk on using social media to support research development at an Association of Research Managers and Administrators training event. The keynote speaker was Andy Miah, professor of science communication and digital media at the University of Salford. His talk was inspiring, exhilarating—and terrifying. He made us all feel like Vasco Balboa, the first European to see the Pacific. The ocean's vast, uncharted waters lay before us, and its huge, untapped potential was awe-inspiring as it glistened in the sunlight.

Most of us have only paddled in the shallows of social media, but Miah exhorted us to cast off from the safety of the shore and head to the deeps. To feel the terror of drowning, before bobbing to the surface and enjoying the freedom of the medium. "If you’re not overwhelmed, you haven’t been paying attention," said Miah. It will be overwhelming and it will be terrifying, but ultimately we all have to take the plunge. The world is changing.

New Public Engagement Fund & Network

Building on the successful launch of the University’s Public Engagement with Research Strategy in June last year, we are pleased to announce that applications are now open for the Public Engagement with Research Fund.

This new fund (£10,000) is a first step towards University-wide funding for Public Engagement with Research and builds on the University’s commitment to embed public engagement with research across the institution. The fund is open to applications (maximum budget £2,000) from academics in all three faculties with a deadline of 21 March 2014. Further details and an application form can be found here.

If you have any questions about the fund please contact Lynne Bennett. We are also launching a Public Engagement with Research Network, which will act as a forum for staff at the University interested in Public Engagement with Research. Meetings will be held once a term and will be facilitated by one or two members of staff experienced in Public Engagement. The first meeting will be held over lunch on Wednesday 2 April (further details to follow). If you are interested in attending this meeting and have any suggestions for themes for future meetings, please let Lynne Bennett know.

Notes from HERA Cultural Encounters Information Session

Last Thursday my colleague Lynne Bennett attended a HERA Cultural Encounters Information Session in London.  The Slides from the event are available here.

If you are planning to make an application to this call (either as the Project Leader or as one of the Principal Investigators), it is important that you contact Lynne asap.  The deadline is 4 May but costings for these are complicated and may take much longer than you anticipate.

Lynne provided the following notes from the event. A few of these would apply equally to all large applications – so even if you’re not planning a HERA application, it’s worth having a look at the following:

• Large collaborative projects should be managed by a steering committee.  Your application should include plans for the committee to meet regularly to review progress against milestones (associated travel costs can be included in the budget);
• All large collaborative projects should include costs for an Administrator at an appropriate level.  In the case of a HERA application, where there are several European partners, it would be reasonable to have 2 or 3 administrators working on different aspects of the project;
•  Project management should include regular team meetings and have a robust internal reporting system 
• For any large AHRC application, knowledge exchange should be embedded throughout the project and should not be added as an afterthought.  (The AHRC are VERY keen on ‘mutually-enriching’ collaborations with non-academic partners.);
• Non Academic Partners can be included but the AHRC will not pay for their time (only travel and subsistence);
• Interdisciplinarity means ‘challenging the familiar and conventional’ and ‘moving the boundaries of the discipline’;
• Collaboration means that you can address familiar questions in new ways that would be impossible for a lone researcher;
• Read the rules – AHRC and the other funders are continually surprised at how many applicants fail to do this;
•  The Project Leader must demonstrate in the application that he/she has the experience and skills to lead the project.

Thanks very much to Lynne for these.

AHRC's Rick Rylance to Visit this Friday

Prof Rick Rylance (Chief Executive of the AHRC and Chair of RCUK Executive Group) will be visiting the University on Friday 17 February. Rick will be speaking to staff at an open meeting in the Darwin Conference Suite at 1.30 pm about the AHRC’s Delivery Plan and strategic direction.

There will be plenty of time for questions so if you have a question about plans for longer and larger grants, the new Fellowship schemes, demand management or the influence of government policy on the Council’s strategy, please come along and ask.

Please let my colleague Lynne Bennett know if you are planning to come along so that she can get an idea of numbers.

Grants Factory: Making a Successful Fellowship Application

Prof. Paul Allain (School of Arts) and Prof. Darren Griffin (School of Biosciences) will lead a new Grants Factory workshop on Monday 13 June on how to make a successful Fellowship application.

Both Paul & Darren have exceptional track records in attracting research funding from a wide variety of sources - their diverse backgrounds will ensure that the workshop appeals to staff in all 3 Faculties.

The workshop will cover presenting yourself and your proposed project in the best possible light and will include a practical session.

It runs from 11.00-2.00pm and includes lunch. Places are limited so contact Lynne Bennett as soon as possible if you would like to participate.

Leverhulme Visit: Programme Announced

More details are available about the programme for the visit on Monday 4 April by Professor Sir Richard Brook, Director of the Leverhulme Trust.

Professor Brook is a materials scientist whose career has included Chairs at the Universities of Leeds and Oxford, Director of the Max Planck Institute and Chief Executive of the EPSRC before joining the Leverhulme Trust in 2001.

There are two parts to the day: first, a series of talks by Kent award holders that highlight both the international reach of Leverhulme, and a specific area of interest (i.e. understanding the past). They also demonstrate the range of funding that the Trust offers. The second part is Professor Sir Richard's talk about the work of the Trust. All staff and postgraduate students are welcome to both.

Talks by Kent Award Holders

International Collaborations and Research

• 11.00 – 11.15 Alan Story (KLS) Research Project Grant - ‘The North to South transplantation of copyright laws and values'
• 11.15 – 11.30 Professor Donna Landry (School of English) Study Abroad Fellowship - ‘Hoofprinting: Evliya Çelebi and Lady Anne Blunt’
• 11.30 – 11.45 Professor Sarah Spurgeon (EDA) ‘Visiting Professorship for Professor Utkin’
  

Understanding the Past

• 11.45 – 12.00 Professor Ray Laurence (SECL) Research Project Grant - ‘Age and communications in the Roman Empire’
• 12.00 – 12.15 Professor Alan Chadwick (SPS) Emeritus Professorship - ‘Nanoparticles as agents in conservation’
  

Talk by Professor Sir Richard Brook

• 13.15 – 14.30, in the Senate Chamber

If you haven’t already contacted Lynne Bennett, please let her know if you intend coming along to either the award holder talks or the talk by Richard Brook (or both) so that she can get an idea of numbers.

Visit by Director of Leverhulme Trust

Professor Sir Richard Brook, Director of the Leverhulme Trust, will be visiting the University on Monday 4 April. Although the final timings for the programme are yet to be finalised, we are expecting him to give his talk to University staff at about 1.15pm in the Senate Chamber (J12 on this map). There will also be a series of brief talks by Leverhulme award holders from 11.00am (also in the Senate Chamber) – again the programme has yet to be finalised.

My colleague Lynne Bennett will circulate the final programme once it is available. Please let her know if you intend coming along to either the award holder talks or the talk by Richard Brook (or both) so that she can get an idea of numbers.

The picture's not Richard Brook, in case you were wondering...it's the man on whom the Leverhulme Trust is built, William Lever, the 1st Viscount Leverhulme himself.