6th OPEN CALL for Short Term Scientific Missions (STSM)

 

Those interested in submitting an application should consult the CA15212 STSM Guidelines for details about eligibility, grants, criteria for evaluation of applications/proposals and how to apply.

Application Deadline

August 15th 2018

Duration

STSMs need to be completed before April 30, 2019.

STSM – Eligibility

STSMs are especially intended for a postgraduate student or postdoctoral fellow or a staff member in an institution, organization or legal entity which participates in this Action and has within its remit a clear association with performing research. Early Career Investigators, that is, researchers whose career spun less than 8 years between the date of the PhD/doctorate (or similar experience) and the date of involvement in this Action will be prioritized.

Evaluation and Selection of Applicants

• Objective: Strengthening the existing networks by allowing researchers to go to an institution in another COST Country to foster collaboration (e.g., to draft proposals, undertake research, etc.). Selected applicants should be targeting Action deliverables as much as possible, e.g. literature reviews or some specific tasks, as stated in the Memorandum of Understanding
• Selection procedure: Detailed guidelines for applicants How to apply for a STSM.pdf

Rules

A STSM may only be approved:

• from a Home Institution in a COST participating country to a Host Institution in another COST participating country or to a formally approved Host Institution in a non-COST country;
• from a formally approved Home Institution in a Near Neighbour Country to a Host Institution in a COST participating country.

Application procedure

The Applicant should:

1. obtain the agreement of the host institution, before submitting his/her application;
2. use the on-line registration tool to register his/her request for an STSM;
3. after registration, download the formal STSM application and complete it with supporting documentation (CV, full work plan, list of publications, motivation letter, letter of support from the home institute etc.);
4. send the application by e-mail as attachment to:
   1. the future Host institution of the STSM,
   2. the Action STSM Coordinator: %20maria [dot] attard [at] um [dot] edu [dot] mt (Maria Attard),
   3. the Action Chair: Katrin [dot] Vohland [at] mfn-berlin [dot] de (Katrin Vohland) and Vice Chair: Anne Land.
5. Submit the Application until the defined Deadline.

After completion of the STSM

Successful applicants will need to submit a scientific report to the Host Institution and to the STSM Chair and Coordinator within 30 days from the end date of the STSM, and they will be responsible for acquiring from a senior researcher affiliated to the Host Institution confirmation of formal acceptance of the scientific report. The scientific report will also require the approval of the Action Chair or STSM coordinator in order to effect the payment of the Grant. Successful applicants will be asked to submit a brief of the STSM outputs for the Action’s website describing in summary the scientific report which will also be made available online, and be prepared to participate in the Action’s events with a poster about their STSM when applicable or when requested by the Chair or STSM coordinator.

The report should include the following information:

• Purpose of the STSM
• Description of the work carried out during the STSM
• Description of the main results obtained
• Future collaboration with the host institution (if applicable)
• Foreseen publications/articles resulting from the STSM (if applicable)

Other details to be included in the report are in the document STSMs: Guidelines for Applicants.

Contacts

STMS Coordinator: Maria Attard (maria [dot] attard [at] um [dot] edu [dot] mt)
MC Chair: Katrin Vohland (katrin [dot] vohland [at] mfn-berlin [dot] de)
MC Vice-Chair: Anne Land (a [dot] m [dot] land [at] biology [dot] leidenuniv [dot] nl)

The Cost Action « Citizen Science to promote creativity, scientific literacy, and innovation throughout Europe » opens funding for STSM related to its axis «Develop Synergies with Education».

This axis focuses on learning outcomes of Citizen Science projects. It aims at increasing awareness about the possibilities of CS in education, by collating the knowledge of current practices and underscoring the meaning of CS in formal and informal education.

Three potential topics have been identified for this STSM call related to Educational synergies

1. Review of training requirements for Citizen Scientists in diverse CS projects. This review should focus on selected European CS projects which prove highly successfull, and investigate both training needs for these projects as expressed by their volunteers,  and training provision as designed by the project team.
2. Review of educational goals of major Citizen Science projects in Europe. This review will analyze which educational goals are set by different projects according to their institutional location (in museums, schools, universities, research labs, communities…) and how these educational goals have been defined and evolved in the course of the projects.
3. Review of evaluation strategies, methodologies and tools. This review will analyze the evaluation strategies, methodologies and tools chosen by selected European CS projects, how this evaluation is implemented, and which are the main difficulties and learnings in the evaluation process.

Application Deadline

 ++++ Re-Open till September 5th 2018 ++++

Duration

STSMs need to be completed before April 30, 2019.

STSM – Eligibility

STSMs are especially intended for a postgraduate student or postdoctoral fellow or a staff member in an institution, organization or legal entity which participates in this Action and has within its remit a clear association with performing research. Early Career Investigators, that is, researchers whose career spun less than 8 years between the date of the PhD/doctorate (or similar experience) and the date of involvement in this Action will be prioritized.

Evaluation and Selection of Applicants

• Objective: Strengthening the existing networks by allowing researchers to go to an institution in another COST Country to foster collaboration (e.g., to draft proposals, undertake research, etc.). Selected applicants should be targeting Action deliverables as much as possible, e.g. literature reviews or some specific tasks, as stated in the Memorandum of Understanding
• Selection procedure: Detailed guidelines for applicants How to apply for a STSM.pdf

Rules

A STSM may only be approved:

• from a Home Institution in a COST participating country to a Host Institution in another COST participating country or to a formally approved Host Institution in a non-COST country
• from a formally approved Home Institution in a Near Neighbour Country to a Host Institution in a COST participating country.

Selected applicants can be hosted for a duration of maximum 2 months, in a foreign institution. Three institutions are currently ready to host STSMs.

1. University of Neuchâtel, Institute of Psychology and Education & Leysin American School, Switzerland
   The collaboration between the Institute of Psychology and Education from the University of Neuchâtel (Neuchâtel, Switzerland) and the Leysin American School (Leysin, Switzerland) focuses on challenges and opportunities in integrating Citizen Science into school, through formal education or after-school programs.
   The Institute of Psychology and Education from the University of Neuchâtel also offers hosting for a candidate who would be interested in exploring training programs and training requirements in online citizen science projects.
   Contact person: Prof.ass. Laure Kloetzer, laure [dot] kloetzer [at] unine [dot] ch
    
2. Faculty of Social Sciences (Education), University of Stirling 
   The team focuses on looking critically at the goals and methodologies for evaluating Citizen Science. We are researching how and when citizen science gives young people meaningful opportunities to learn new skills, engage with the scientific community and find out how scientific observation can deepen understanding, connection and knowledge of our local places. Different models and approaches to Citizen Science may result in different outcomes relating to environmental education - for example learning for sustainability, place-connectedness, connection to nature.
   Contact person: Dr Greg Mannion, greg [dot] mannion [at] stir [dot] ac [dot] uk ​
    
3.  AGES, Austrian Agency for Health and Food Safety, Vienna, Austria.
   AGES is a government owned agency and research organisation. Key responsibilities of AGES are agriculture, food security and food safety, food quality, nutrition, animal health and public health. AGES is responsible for food from soil to fork, effective control and prevention of epidemics for people, animals and plants and providing effective and safe pharmaceutical products. AGES is coordinating the Sparkling Science project "TeaTime4Schools", where students bury tea and investigate the relation between decomposition and microbial activity of the soil with DNA extraction workshops at the Vienna Open Lab [www.teatime4schools.at].
   Contact person : Dr. Taru Sandén,  taru [dot] sanden [at] ages [dot] at

Candidates can also propose their own hosting institution.

Application procedure

The Applicant should:

1. obtain the agreement of the host institution, before submitting his/her application;
2. use the on-line registration tool to register his/her request for an STSM;
3. after registration, download the formal STSM application and complete it with supporting documentation (CV, full work plan, list of publications, motivation letter, letter of support from the home institute etc.);
4. send the application by e-mail as attachment to:
   1. the future Host institution of the STSM,
   2. the Action STSM Coordinator: %20maria [dot] attard [at] um [dot] edu [dot] mt (Prof. Maria Attard),
   3. the Action Chair: Katrin [dot] Vohland [at] mfn-berlin [dot] de (Dr. Katrin Vohland) and Vice Chair: Anne Land.
5. Submit the Application until the defined Deadline.

After completion of the STSM

Successful applicants will need to submit a scientific report to the Host Institution and to the STSM Chair and Coordinator within 30 days from the end date of the STSM, and they will be responsible for acquiring from a senior researcher affiliated to the Host Institution confirmation of formal acceptance of the scientific report. The scientific report will also require the approval of the Action Chair or STSM coordinator in order to effect the payment of the Grant. Successful applicants will be asked to submit a brief of the STSM outputs for the Action’s website describing in summary the scientific report which will also be made available online, and be prepared to participate in the Action’s events with a poster about their STSM when applicable or when requested by the Chair or STSM coordinator.

The report should include the following information:

• Purpose of the STSM
• Description of the work carried out during the STSM
• Description of the main results obtained
• Future collaboration with the host institution (if applicable)
• Foreseen publications/articles resulting from the STSM (if applicable)

Other details to be included in the report are in the document STSMs: Guidelines for Applicants.

Contacts

STMS Coordinator: Maria Attard (maria [dot] attard [at] um [dot] edu [dot] mt)
MC Chair: Katrin Vohland (katrin [dot] vohland [at] mfn-berlin [dot] de)
MC Vice-Chair: Anne Land (a [dot] m [dot] land [at] biology [dot] leidenuniv [dot] nl)