Funding for research post as Academy Research Fellow 2020, all research fields

Successful applicants will have been engaged in successful scientific publication and collaboration since gaining their doctoral degree.

When you apply for funding for a research post as Academy Research Fellow, you apply for funding for your own salary for five years.Academy Research Fellows work on research plans that have been rated to be of a high scientific quality.They have built extensive research networks, and the funding allows them to develop their academic leadership skills and establish themselves as independent researchers in the international scientific community.

A post as Academy Research Fellow provides a researcher with a good and diverse opportunity to work independently on their research and to contribute to developing the research in their field.As an Academy Research Fellow, you are encouraged to engage in international research collaboration and mobility across international and sectoral borders, for example, so that you will work part of the term abroad.Foreign researchers who already work or who will work in the Finnish scientific community may also apply for the funding.

The applicant is a researcher with 3–9 years of experience since completing their doctoral degree (degree certificate issued 30 Sep 2011–30 Sep 2017), or up to 13 years if they have since completed medical specialist training.

Applicants who have completed their doctoral degree more than nine years ago can be considered only for special reasons (maternity, paternity, parental or childcare leave, military service or nonmilitary service, or long-term illness). If you plead these special reasons, justify them in the application under ‘Personal data’, ‘Degrees’, ‘Additional information’. If these reasons are confidential, the applicant must get in touch with the programme’s contact person named in the call text (see Contacts).

Mobility since completing the doctoral degree is required from applicants for funding for a research post as Academy Research Fellow (see Mobility requirement). If an application for funding for a research post as Academy Research Fellow concerns the same research environment where the applicant worked while completing their doctoral degree, the applicant must have at least six months of research experience from another research environment or research-supporting experience from another sector since PhD completion. The experience may have been gained over several spells; the two longest spells must equal at least six months. Deviations from this general rule are possible only on special grounds. In the September 2020 call, we will take into account that the COVID-19 pandemic may have interrupted or cancelled the researcher’s mobility. If the applicant has been unable to meet the mobility requirement due to COVID-19 (e.g. the foreign organisation has not been able to commit to acting as host), the applicant must describe the reasons and be able to provide proof. Provide the reasons described above in the application under ‘Mobility’. After the call deadline, please provide relevant certificates (e.g. airline tickets or invitation) in the application’s additional information. Academy research funding is granted to Finnish sites of research.

‘Research environment’ refers to the research team or community in which the researcher works. The research environment is often located within a single organisation (i.e. the site of research), but it may also extend to several sites. The mobility requirement mentioned above is automatically met in cases where the applicant applies for funding for a research post in a research environment other than the one in which they worked while completing their doctoral degree.

Read more in the detailed guidelines for meeting the mobility requirement.

Special terms and restrictions

In the September call, we will consider only one application per researcher if the application concerns Academy Project Funding (incl. a consortium subproject), Academy Research Fellow Funding, Postdoctoral Researcher Funding or Clinical Researcher Funding. If you do submit more than one application for any of these funding opportunities or apply for funding from more than one of them, we will only review the first application to arrive. Applications that are not reviewed will not be eligible for funding.

If you are appointed to a professorship for an indefinite term while your application is being processed, please notify us without delay. Academy Research Fellow funding is not granted to persons who hold tenured professorships or other corresponding senior-level research posts at research organisations.

If the applicant has ongoing Academy funding, they must draw up an interim report in the online services on each ongoing project (incl. consortium subproject) before the call deadline. Read the guidelines on drafting the interim report.

A researcher who has received Academy funding for a research post as Postdoctoral Researcher cannot be granted Academy Research Fellow funding until towards the end of the Postdoctoral Researcher funding period.

A person applying for post as an Academy Research Fellow may be granted funding for one five-year term only.

We will not process an application if the applicant has been found guilty of research misconduct in the three years preceding the year of the call.

The research councils will update their science policies in May‒June. The funding decisions are based on the policies of each research council. The policies will be updated on our website before the call opens. Read the policies of the research council before submitting your application.

Academy Research Fellow salary

Research posts as Academy Research Fellow are filled for five years. The funding period is 1 September 2021–31 August 2026. Separate decisions will be made in spring 2021 on funding for salary costs and funding for research costs of Academy Research Fellows. The funding period may be changed only for special reasons (see ‘Who can apply’ in the call text).

The funding towards the salary of an Academy Research Fellow is determined according to a monthly salary of 5,100 euros. We will also allocate funding for indirect employee costs (28%) and overheads (14.29%, i.e. the funding includes an overhead share of 12.5%).

The Academy Research Fellow’s site of research is an organisation based in Finland through which the funding is paid. During the funding period, the Academy Research Fellow may work abroad for periods of varying durations, for example at foreign universities.

The salary of an Academy Research Fellow may also be co-funded, where appropriate in terms of supporting the researcher’s career advancement. This requires that the externally funded salary part has been allocated to research tasks or other tasks in support of the researcher’s career, such as tasks that are part of the university’s tenure-track system. The guidance value for the Academy’s contribution to the researcher’s salary costs is 70 per cent, unless there are reasons for a higher contribution. The corresponding contribution to those funded through ERC schemes or Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions is up to 50 per cent. The Academy’s salary funding that is freed as a result of salary co-funding can be used for other research costs, which are justified separately.

Academy Research Fellow research costs

Having received the decision on their salary funding, the recipients of Academy Research Fellow funding can submit a separate application for a grant to cover research costs. The funding is granted to cover costs of setting up a research team, research costs, costs of international collaboration and mobility and other research costs. As the full cost model is applied to the applications for research cost funding, the Academy’s contribution to funding covers no more than 70% of the estimated total research costs.

However, you must also append a tentative funding plan for research costs to your application under ‘Research costs’. Read more about the research councils’ policies concerning research costs.

What is required from the site of research?

We require that the site of research (e.g. university) provides the research project with all necessary basic facilities. These are determined based on the nature of the research and are the same as those available to other research staff at the site: office and laboratory premises, equipment (incl. computer equipment), and telecommunications, telephone, mailing, copying and library services. When accepting the funding, the site of research is responsible for ensuring that necessary statements and permits from ethics committees have been obtained before the start of the project. The site of research also commits to ensuring that the data management plan can be implemented at the site of research, and that the measures to be taken comply with good data management practice. Read more in the guidelines on the commitment by the site of research.

The application must also include the overheads percentage, indirect employee costs and coefficient for effective working hours of the site of research. The site of research maintains these percentages in the online services under the site’s details.

When the site of research is a university or a research institute, as a rule, the funding must be applied for VAT included. Consult the financial administration at the site of research for more information. The Academy’s funding may also cover VAT costs, but only on certain conditions (see Value added tax and read more in the funding terms and conditions).

Research at EUI or IIASA by Academy Research Fellows

Those applying for Academy Research Fellow funding can also apply to do research at the European University Institute (EUI) as part of the Academy Research Fellow term. The EUI can receive one Academy-funded Academy Research Fellow at a time to carry out research at the EUI for 1–2 years. You need not append a separate invitation from the EUI to your application or contact the EUI. However, please read about EUI research before applying and contact the Academy’s EUI contact person (see below) when drafting your application.

During the Academy funding period, Academy Research Fellows can also visit the multidisciplinary International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA), which focuses on global issues that require broad-based, multidisciplinary research cooperation. IIASA develops and utilises methods of systems analysis, but the applicant is not required to have knowledge of these methods. If your research is linked to one of IIASA’s research projects, you can agree on the visit with IIASA and append IIASA’s invitation to your application for Academy Research Fellow funding. You should also contact the Academy’s IIASA contact person for more details.

How to submit and supplement the application

The deadline is non-negotiable. The deadline for applications is 30 September 2020 at 16.15 Finnish time.

Make sure to submit the application in good time before the deadline. The system will only accept applications that contain all obligatory information.

You can edit and supplement the application until the deadline. You can make changes to a submitted application (e.g. change appendices), but you must make them before the deadline. If you notice that your application lacks important information after the deadline, immediately get in touch with the call’s contact person, so that they can reopen the application for you. Make sure to re-submit the application after you have supplemented it. We will consider the additions insofar as it is possible in view of the review and decision-making process. We may ask applicants to supplement their applications. If the applicant has not supplemented the application by the given deadline, we may decide not to process the application. Applicants must make sure that their contact details (email address) are up to date.

How the application becomes pending

According to section 17 of the Finnish Administrative Procedure Act and section 8 of the Act on Electronic Services and Communication in the Public Sector, the sender is responsible for the application arriving by the set deadline. An application becomes pending at the Academy when the online application and the obligatory appendices have been submitted in the online services. The system will confirm a successful submission by sending an email to the address provided by the applicant.

Publicity and data protection

Except for the research plan, plan of intent, abstract and interim report, which are primarily confidential, the application and its appendices are public documents. For example, the CV is a public document and as such must not include any confidential information. This publicity is based on the Finnish Act on the Openness of Government Activities. The Academy is committed to following regulations on data protection. The GDPR-compliant privacy statement concerning the research funding process is available on our website under Data protection.

The application consists of forms completed in the online services and PDF appendices. As an applicant, you have the right to submit your application in Finnish or Swedish, but we ask that you to submit it in English to facilitate the international review.

Most of the links below take you to the A–Z index of application guidelines on our website.

The online application contains the following parts

Personal data

• Personal details
• Degrees (most recent one first); parental leaves etc. may be filled in under ‘Additional information’
• Titles of docent and professorships

CV

• CV following the template, no more than two pages

General information

• Details on the site of research
• Title of research project in English and Finnish/Swedish
• Research fields (at least one, no more than five). See the research field classification.
• Keywords in English and Finnish/Swedish

Abstract

• Maximum length 2,500 characters including spaces
• Brief overview of scientific and societal objectives, research methods and data as well as expected research results and impact
• Read more about the Abstract.

Research plan

• Maximum length 12 pages
• See the guidelines on the structure of the research plan.
• See the how-to guides for the online services.

Most relevant publications

• No more than ten of your most important project-relevant publications
• You can retrieve publication details from the VIRTA publication information service. Also see our how-to guide for the online services.
• Details on publications may also be entered manually. Obligatory information: author(s), title, year of publication, name of series/journal, type of publication (will not show in the PDF version of the application)

Mobility

• Mobility requirement: After the doctorate, the applicant must have at least six months of national or international mobility, which must be justified in the application. The mobility requirement is also met if the researcher changes research environments. Read more about the mobility requirement.
• Reasons for possible deviations from the mobility requirement due to the COVID-19 pandemic. A document of proof for the deviation shall be appended under the application’s additional information after the call has closed.
• Other period of mobility after doctorate
• Mobility period planned for the project and how it supports the implementation of the research
• See more information on mobility.

Collaborators

• Project collaborators, itemised by collaborator (name, organisation, country)
• Describe the collaborators’ project-relevant merits and the justifications for choosing them in section 3.2 of the research plan.
• If necessary, append a letter of commitment. See the guidelines on the letter of commitment.

Affiliations

• Research infrastructures: Indicate what kinds of equipment, resources or data reserves provided by national or international research infrastructures the project plans to use. The menu includes infrastructures included in Finland’s national roadmap and/or ESFRI’s roadmap. Other possible infrastructures are entered in a free-text field. Read more about research infrastructures.
• Centres of Excellence in Research: Read more about Centres of Excellence.
• Finnish Flagships: Read more about the Finnish Flagship Programme.

Research ethics

• Ethical permit for project (yes/no)
• Found guilty of research misconduct (yes/no). We will not process a funding application if the applicant has been found guilty of research misconduct in the three years preceding the year of the call.
• The research ethics description is entered under section 4.1 of the research plan.
• See the ethical guidelines.

Salary

• Funding period: 1 September 2021–31 August 2026
• Monthly salary according to the call text, 5,100 euros
• Funding for a post as Academy Research Fellow is intended for the researcher’s own salary.
• Commitment by site of research. Make sure you have a commitment from your site of research (usually a university or research institute) to supporting the project. Read more in the guidelines on the commitment by the site of research.

Research costs

• Preliminary budget for the duration of the Academy Professor post with justifications for research grants applied for later and the funding currently being applied for. The cost estimate must be realistic.
• The Academy’s contribution to funding comes to no more than 70% of the total research costs.
• Research team salaries and other expenses

Public project description

• Maximum length 1,000 characters including spaces
• Popular and reader-friendly description of the research project in English and Finnish/Swedish
• The public description helps the Academy to disseminate information on the research project. The project description is also stored in the National Research Information Hub, which will make available information on research conducted in Finland.
• Read the guidelines on the public project description.

Authorisation

• You can authorise another person to supplement or view your application.
• Start by entering the person’s name in the field.
• The person must have an account in the Academy’s online services (SARA).
• You cannot authorise more than one person at a time to edit a field in your application, and you cannot edit that same field while the authorisation is active.
• Do not authorise yourself.
• See technical instructions on the authorisation process in the how-to guides for the online services.

Appendices

• Appendices must be PDF files.

Obligatory appendices

• Complete list of publications. Read the guidelines on the structure of the list of publications.
• Finnish doctoral degree certificate or English-language doctoral degree certificate of a degree obtained abroad; please do not append any transcripts

Case-specific appendices

• Invitation letter for research visit. Invitation by host organisation (e.g. university or research institute), if the work or part of it will be conducted at a place other than the site of research mentioned in the application; please do not append any letters of recommendation Read the guidelines on the invitation letter.
• Letter of commitment: See the guidelines on the letter of commitment.
• Research plan following the template (no more than 12 pages); append only if the research plan has not been filled in on the tab ‘Research plan’ See the guidelines on the structure of the research plan.

Submit application

• You can submit the application when you have filled in or attached all the necessary information.
• A red warning triangle on the tab tells you that some information is missing.
• You can supplement the application until the deadline. Resaving will replace the earlier version.
• If you want to supplement the application after the deadline, please get in touch with the contact persons listed in the call text.

Interim report

• If the applicant has ongoing Academy funding, they must draw up an interim report in the online services on each ongoing project (incl. consortium subproject) before the call deadline. Read the guidelines on drafting the interim report.
• See the how-to guides for the online services.

Academy of Finland funding is granted based on peer review. We mainly use foreign experts as reviewers.

The applications are primarily reviewed in international panels. The panel drafts one review report on each application. At least two individual reviews are requested for applications with a subject that does not fit into any of the panels.

Review criteria:

• scientific quality, innovativeness and novelty value of the research as well as its impact within the scientific community
• competence of applicant/research team in terms of project implementation
• feasibility of research plan (incl. research ethics)
• quality of research environment and collaborative networks
• researcher mobility and researcher training.

Read the review questions that will be used in the review: Academy Research Fellow review form and review guidelines. The Academy’s review guidelines and forms are only available in English.

Each panel will rank the applications that have received a rating of 5 or 6.

The research councils will update their science policies in May‒June. The funding decisions are based on the policies of each research council. The policies will be updated on our website before the call opens. Read the policies of the research council before submitting your application.

The research council will make the funding decisions in two stages in spring 2021. At the first stage, applications that have received rating 1–4 in the review will receive a negative decision at the discretion of the research council concerned. The rest of the applications will be processed at the second stage (mainly applications that received a rating of 5–6). The second-stage funding decisions may be either positive or negative.

You will receive an email notification after the funding decision has been made. After receiving the email, you can log in to the online services with your user ID to view the decision and its justifications. A positive funding decision will be accompanied by the terms and conditions of funding. In the online services, you will also have access to the review report, which may include the panel ranking (panels rank the best applications).

The recipient of the Academy Research Fellow funding can apply for funding to cover research costs. The presenting official of the funding instrument will contact them after the funding decision has been made.

How to receive the funding

A positive funding decision is accompanied by the terms and conditions of funding. Make sure to check the decision and accept the funding and its terms in the online services without delay. This must be done via the Academy’s online services within eight weeks of the decision date, unless otherwise stated in the special conditions of the decision notification.

Before you accept the funding, update the popular project description (if necessary), make changes to the annual instalments (if necessary) and attach the data management plan (drafted according to the guidelines). Once you have accepted the funding, the system will send a notification to the commitment issuer at the site of research. That person must also accept the granted funding.

The funds can be paid only after the applicant and the representative of the site of research have accepted them. The system will then notify the funding to the finance administration of the site of research, whereupon the funds will be ready to use.