Tag Archives: European

Benefits of getting involved with a Marie Curie Exchange

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A report funded by the European Commission highlights the impact Marie Currie Fellowships have on researchers long-term careers. The findings were that completing a Marie Curie Fellowship has a definite beneficial impact on a researchers career prospects. The report compared the career paths of Marie Curie Fellows funded under FP4, FP5, and FP6 to a control group.

The Marie Curie fellows reported that the fellowship contributed significantly to other career drivers such as access to high quality research, facility and labs, enlarging professional networks and improving interdisciplinary skills.

It was found that the Marie Curie Fellowships could improve immediate employability slightly better than other types of fellowships.

The study also showed that all other factors considered, the Marie Curie Fellows publications were more often cited that the control groups and were more frequently published in influential scientific journals.

Marie Curie Fellowships are available under the Horizon 2020. There is a call currently open with a deadline date of 11 September. It is open to all research areas, even though they say scientific researchers in the guidance notes. Fellows can be based in a European country or be seconded to a country outside of Europe for 12 months. For more information see http://blogs.staffs.ac.uk/research/2014/03/18/marie-sklodowska-curie-actions-msca-individual-fellowships-call/

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View Marie Curie report summary here: http://ec.europa.eu/research/fp7/pdf/mca/marie_curie_researchers_and_their_long-term_career_development_-_executive_summary_en.pdf#view=fit&pagemode=none

European Health Programme

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The European Commission has approved funding for a new programme for health. This programme could be of interest to researchers in the University involved in health based research. The objectives of this fund are to:

  • strengthen action to promote health and prevent diseases;
  • be better prepared to protect citizens against health emergencies and to coordinate action at European level to address them;
  • increase the up-take of innovation in health; and
  • improve people’s access to medical expertise and information for specific conditions; and improve healthcare quality and patient safety.

It is expected that the first calls for proposals will come out by early May 2014. It is expected that they will launch an annual call for proposals.

The funders will cover between 60-80% of project costs, so projects will require a degree of match funding.

Universities are eligible to apply. The fund will include action grants that contribute to the cost of joint transnational projects; and plus tenders for public procurement contracts.

More details on this programme can be found here http://ec.europa.eu/health/programme/policy/2014-2020/state_of_play_en.htm

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Info Day: http://ec.europa.eu/health/programme/events/info_day_2014_en.htm

Cultural Heritage and European Identities

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The European Commission has officially launched the Horizon 2020 Reflexive Societies call for 2015.

The calls include projects that will look at Cultural Heritage and European Identities.

They are looking for projects that will show how digital cultural resources can promote creativity and generate innovation in research, lead to richer interpretations of the past, bring new perspectives to questions of identity and culture, and generate societal and economic benefits.

Projects should enable new models to be developed of Europe’s cultural and intellectual history and to bring cultural content to new audiences in novel ways.

The deadline is 21 April 2015.

Projects will need to work with a consortium of European Partners. Groups who are successful in this call will start developing their consortium now.

The commission is looking to award funds of €2-4 million for projects.

Further Information: http://ec.europa.eu/research/participants/portal/desktop/en/opportunities/h2020/topics/2104-reflective-6-2015.html

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Overview of European Funding

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UKRO The University is a subscriber to the UK Research Office (UKRO). This specialises in European funding and events. You can subscribe for emails when funding calls and events are open in your research area.

To join use this link http://ims.ukro.ac.uk/UKRO/login.aspx and click on the option ‘If you do not yet have a profile’. The site will use your email address to identify you are a member of staff at Staffordshire University and give you free access to it. You subscribe to emails using the ‘My Profiles’ section at the top of the page.

If you want to visit the main UKRO website you can access it here: www.ukro.ac.uk

Erasmus+ The Erasmus+ programme will run from 2014-2020 and supports activities in education, training, youth and sport across all sectors of lifelong learning including Higher Education, Further Education, adult education, schools and youth activities.

Erasmus+ aims to boost skills and employability as well as modernise education, training, and youth work across Europe. It will provide opportunities for over 4 million Europeans to study, train, gain work experience and volunteer abroad and will also support transnational partnerships between education, training and youth organisations, as well as support grassroots sport projects

http://www.erasmusplus.org.uk/how-to-apply

Horizon 2020 is the EU funding programme for research and innovation, which will run from 2014 to 2020. UKRO have created the diagram below giving an overview of the different funding strands. When you log into your UKRO account you can click each of the strands and it will take you to a factsheet about them. Details on how to log into UKRO are above.

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http://www.ukro.ac.uk/subscriber/funding/Pages/index.aspx

Getting up to Speed on European Funding

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Book your place on Staffordshire University’s annual workshop, Getting up to Speed on European Funding.

Special guest, Eevi Laukkanen, will be coming to Staffordshire University on 11 December 2013. Eevi is from UKRO in Brussels and will be talking about the new European funding streams being launched in January 2014.

The event will be held in LT113 Ashley. There are three open sessions which staff are invited to book on onto:

9:30-11:55 Welcome to Horizon 2020, LT113 Ashley, Stoke
• Horizon 2020, the replacement for FP7 which funds research and innovation

12:10-13:00 Discovering Erasmus+, LT113 Ashley, Stoke
• Erasmus+, funding education and vocational training scheme

14:00-14:45 H2020 rules of participation and financial models LT113 Ashley, Stoke

If you wish to book onto any of these sessions please email  externalprojects@staffs.ac.uk specifying which session(s).

Plus for those of you who already have ideas in mind of projects to develop we have a limited number of 20 minute one to one slots to enable you to get expert advice from Eevi Laukkanen on developing your application. Anyone who is interested in these should email the External Projects Team directly on the address below.

• 16:00-17:00 –One to one sessions –LT113 Ashley, Stoke

For further details please email externalprojects@staffs.ac.uk

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Funding for Staff Exchanges

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The European Commission are running a final round of funding under the Marie Curie Fellowships.  They help academic staff in different countries to develop their experience, or bring new expertise to Institutions. The three types of fellowships are open to all kinds of research areas.

IIF –International Incoming Fellowships -Experienced researchers outside the EU carry out high level research in an EU institution for 2-3 years –These are useful if you know someone from outside Europe that you would like to bring to the UK to work at the University.

IEF-Intra-European Fellowships for Career Development – Experienced researchers develop a long term training plan enable them to advance significantly in their career. They go to a host organisation in Europe for 12-24 months. An interesting way for Staffordshire University to get involved with these might be if you know someone in another European country that you would like to get over to the UK.

IOF –International Outgoing Fellowships for Career Development – Experienced researchers carry out high level research in countries outside of the EU for up to three years. These projects might be of interest if you feel you wish to work in a different country for a number of years, you will need to know where you want to work.

You have until 14 August 2013 to apply.

Applicants will need a clear project idea, as the EU is looking for quite detailed bids. However, if your project idea is well defined, it is a relatively straightforward application process.

The funds do not cover University overheads. It is essentially a flat rate payment to the staff doing the exchange and flat rate payment for a management fee.

Staffordshire University has not made as much use of these funds as we could have done, we don’t have any applications in the pipeline at the moment, whereas Keele University are looking at submitting fourteen bids! The External Projects Team is able to support with bid writing, but advise that you start working it up as soon as possible, if you are interested in applying please email externalprojects@staffs.ac.uk. If you don’t think you are ready to apply for this round it is expected that similar funding opportunities will be available next year in the in new Horizon 2020 programme.

Further details: http://ec.europa.eu/research/mariecurieactions/about-mca/actions/index_en.htm

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Final Eco-Innovation Call Launched

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The European Commission has launched the final call for the Eco-Innovation Fund. This is not a brilliant fund as it only covers 50% of costs. But could be worth looking into if work is already being developed around this theme.

 Funding body: European Commission

Scheme: Eco-Innovation

Overview: The Eco-Innovation initiative is designed to support projects on the first application or market replication of eco-innovative techniques, products, services or practices which have already been technically demonstrated with success but which, owing to residual risk, have not yet entered the market.

The priorities for this year’s call are:

•           Materials Recycling;

•           Sustainable Building Products;

•           Food and Drink Sector;

•           Water; and

•           Greening businesses.

Deadlines: 05/09/2013

Budget: Grants for successful projects cover up to 50% of the eligible project costs, and this call has a total budget of €31 million.

Website: http://ec.europa.eu/environment/eco-innovation/apply-funds/call-proposal/index_en.htm

 An Information Day on the 2013 call is also taking place in Brussels on Monday 27 May. Registration can be done via the web page above.

Funding for university cooperation and mobility

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The European Commission have launched their latest round of funding to support the cooperation of higher education institutions across Europe.  Erasmus Mundus is a cooperation and mobility programme that aims to enhance the quality of European higher education and to promote dialogue and understanding between people and cultures through cooperation with third countries. In addition, it contributes to the development of human resources and the international cooperation capacity of higher education institutions in third countries by increasing mobility between the European Union and these countries. Priorities for this call are for the development of Erasmus Mundus partnerships for curriculum based exchanges of staff and students and the promotion of European Higher Education.

 

The call deadline is 15th April 2013.  Further information can be found here http://eacea.ec.europa.eu/erasmus_mundus/funding/2013/call_eacea_38_12_en.php.  Please contact the External Projects Team if you are interested (externalprojects@staffs.ac.uk).  Staffordshire University has prior experience of success in this funding stream and we are keen to support new applications.