Aim
Applicants for Academy Project funding apply for funding to set up a research team.
The Academy Project funding scheme is designed to promote the quality and diversity of research, scientific and extra-scientific impact as well as science self-renewal. The aim is to attain internationally as high a scientific standard of work as possible and to support scientific breakthroughs and top-tier international research collaboration.
The funding is granted primarily to teams of researchers with doctoral degrees. In Academy Projects, we encourage researchers to engage in international mobility that will support the research, for example, so that a researcher hired to the project works abroad for a fixed period. The project may also hire a foreign researcher who already works or will work in the Finnish scientific community.
How to apply?
Funding
Academy Project funding can be used to cover both direct and indirect research costs of the research team arising from, for example, the following:
- working hours (salary)
- research
- travel
- national and international collaboration and mobility
- work and researcher training abroad
- preparation of international projects
- publishing (e.g. open access publishing using the golden route).
See Appendix 2 A of the September 2016 call text for the average Academy Project funding granted in spring 2016.
Funding period
As a rule, the funding is granted for four years, starting on 1 September 2017.
Special conditions and restrictions
Academy Project funding is primarily intended towards the salaries of researchers who work full-time on the project and for other project costs. For guidelines on the PI’s salary, see page 4 of the September 2016 call text.
In the September call, we will consider only one application per researcher for Academy Project funding (incl. a consortium subproject) or for funding for a research post as Academy Research Fellow or Postdoctoral Researcher. If you do submit more than one application for any of these funding opportunities, or apply for more than one type of such funding, we will only review the first application to arrive. Applications that are not reviewed will not be eligible for funding.
If you have ongoing Academy Project funding (an independent project or a consortium subproject), or funding allocated to an Academy Research Fellow or an Academy Professor for hiring a research team, you will not be eligible to receive funding for a simultaneous Academy Project except for very compelling reasons.
In the September 2016 call, however, a PI who has an ongoing project with Academy Project funding ending on 31 December 2017 can be granted Academy Project funding as of 1 September 2017.
Directors, vice directors and team leaders of Academy-funded Centres of Excellence cannot receive Academy Project funding during the first three years of the CoE term.
How to apply
The non-negotiable deadline for applications is 28 September 2016 at 16.15. The deadline also applies to consortia. Draft the application in the Academy’s online services. Select Open calls > Academy Project funding.
Draft the application so that the Academy’s contribution to funding comes to no more than 70% of the estimated total project costs. Read more on our website under Full cost model.
If the applicant is a consortium, see detailed guidelines on our website under Guidelines for consortium application. Please note that consortium PIs can submit the consortium application only after all consortium subprojects have completed their applications. The non-negotiable call deadline also applies to consortia. Consortium compositions cannot be changed after the deadline has expired. The consortium guidelines for the September 2016 call will be updated before the call opens.
Who is eligible to apply?
The leader of an Academy Project (the principal investigator, or PI) must have the qualifications of a professor or docent. In September 2016, the Academy of Finland especially encourages early-career researchers to apply for Academy Project funding.
If the PI does not have an employment relationship with, for example, a university or research institute, they must explain in the application how their salary will be covered during the project’s funding period. These details must be accounted for in the application.
When the call opens, please check the Academy’s website for possible additional guidelines.
This opportunity has expired. It was originally published here:
http://www.aka.fi/en/funding/apply-now/our-funding-opportunities/academy-calls/september-2016-call/