The ESRC New Investigator Grant scheme is suitable for early career researchers who have yet to make the transition to be an independent researcher. Proposals are welcome in any topic which falls within ESRC’s remit, including projects at the “interface with the wider sciences”, provided that social sciences accounts for at least 50% of the proposed research. The ESRC will award grants of between £100-350K (covered at 80% of EC).

University Internal selection (deadline Friday, 8 Nov 24)

The ESRC expect the University to run an internal selection process to ensure that we submit only bids from outstanding individuals with the potential to become the research leaders of the future. The University may only submit a limited number of applications. To meet these requirements, this call will be overseen by a cross-school Committee, as decided by the University’s Research Policy Committee.

There are three internal calls every year (October, March, and June). Only applicants whose proposals have been approved through the internal selection process will be allowed to proceed with submission of their applications to ESRC.

Required documents for the selection process:

• Your research project proposal (download template)
• A letter of support from your Head of Department
  • This letter is very important to the success of the application as it is needed to confirm the details of the departmental support and the applicant’s eligibility. The letter must also specify a Faculty-based mentor, and a reviewer, both of whom have agreed to provide feedback on the full proposal, should the applicant be selected to proceed. The reviewer may be from within or outside the applicant’s Faculty. Please note that naming a reviewer is an internal requirement, and the reviewer will not be named on the full application to ESRC. The mentor and the named reviewer will be expected to provide feedback on the full proposal prior to submission to ESRC. This will be coordinated by the School Research Facilitator.
• An X5 PDF report
  • The report should show the preliminary costing for the project, including the cost of the applicant’s salary and research assistance (if required). The Faculty Research Administrator (researchadmin@mmll.cam.ac.uk) will assist you with creating an X5. The X5 will not be submitted for ROO approval at this stage; the costing is for indicative purposes only, to inform the internal selection. It will be possible to modify it after the internal selection.

Interested applicants should initially contact the Faculty Research Administrator to receive more information on the internal selection process and the Faculty funding application procedure.