NAWA URGENCY GRANTS – III EDITION

The National Agency for Academic Exchange has announced the 3rd Edition of the call for applications for: NAWA URGENCY GRANTS.

Due to the limited number of applications to be submitted by a HEI (a maximum of 3 applications), we kindly ask you to prepare preliminary proposals on the template of the Project Initiative, and send them in electronic version by 15 April 2022 to the address: awn@wum.edu.pl.

Rules of the program:

The objective of the programme is to support the international cooperation of research teams or the international mobility of researchers in response to sudden, important unforeseen social, civilisation and natural events with global or regional implications. The implementation of projects under the programme will enable researchers to collect data, acquire new knowledge, investigate the effects and significance of an extreme phenomenon or event as soon as possible after its occurrence.

Applications submitted under the programme must pertain to research activities that may not be implemented by applying for other existing funding mechanisms due to the need for a rapid response. A grant can only be awarded if applying for standard sources of funding could lead to the loss of a unique opportunity to solve a significant issue.

Participation in the programme will enable researchers to undertake intervention research in international cooperation and to develop solutions relevant for responding to landmark events.

Applications under the programme may be submitted by Polish research and higher education institutions. Projects under the programme can be carried out for a period of 3 to 12 months.

The call for proposals is conducted in two rounds:

1) from 28 March to 30 June 2022 at 3.00 p.m.,

2) from 1 September to 15 November 2022 at 3.00 p.m.

or until the budget of the programme is exhausted. At the moment when the allocation is exhausted, the Call is closed in the Agency’s electronic system, and a suitable announcement will be published on the Agency’s website. On the day of opening the second application round, the Agency will inform through its website about the amount of the remaining funds under the Programme.

The application should be completed in English. Exceptions are the Applicant’s authorisations constituting appendices to the Application, Applicant’s registry documents and statements which can be drawn up in Polish.

The scope of areas of the activities implemented under the Programme

• The Project covers international cooperation of research teams or mobility of scientists, whereas the implemented activities should be of importance for the development of science and contribute to internationalization of the Applicant’s scientific activity;
• The Project must refer to the current phenomena and processes of unique, unpredictable, atypical and important nature in global or regional scale;
• The Project must include an element of novelty and a clearly specified research problem;
• The Project justification must clearly indicate that failure to start it will involve losing an opportunity to solve the problem in question in the most suitable time and that it is not possible to finance it through application for other existing financing mechanisms;
• The key element of the Project is international cooperation of the Project Group or international mobility of scientists focused on the implementation of the scientific goals of the Project. As regards research projects which involve research expeditions and in-situ work in the area of occurrence of phenomena or processes of unique nature and requiring urgent intervention, it is possible that the Application includes solely the activities connected with international mobility;
• The foreign partner may be an academic or research centre with its seat outside the borders of the Republic of Poland with which the Applicant is planning to implement the Project. For projects related to international cooperation of the Project Group, the Applicant shall present letter(s) of intent from the foreign Partner(s). As regards projects involving solely scientists’ mobility, a letter of intent from the foreign Partner is not required;
• The Project Group shall consist of:
  • persons employed by the Applicant based on a contract of employment or a civil-law contract,
  • the head of the Project Group holding at least a PhD degree.
• The Applicant undertakes to provide open access to the scientific articles created under the Project by means of their being published in an open-access journal or by making their final author’s version available in an open repository of publications (so-called: Author's Accepted Manuscript) or published publisher’s version (so-called: Version of Record). Open access to the publication must be provided at the moment of its being published at the latest (lack of temporal embargo). The preferred manner of ensuring open access to the publication should be leading to its being available on the Creative Commons (CC BY) licence or Creative Commons – on the same conditions (CC BY-SA). The Applicant undertakes to provide open access to the research data generated under the Project through their being published in an open data repository of research data, with the preference of their being available on the terms and conditions specified in the Creative Commons Zero (CC0) statement.         

The following activities  may be funded under the programme:

• costs of salaries of persons directly involved in the implementation of activities within the project;
• costs of obtaining expert opinions, studies, commissioning research, analytical and statistical tasks (e.g. regarding biobanking, computer simulations, modelling, laboratory analyses, collecting data and materials, aerial and satellite photos), etc.;
• travel and subsistence expenses incurred in connection with the project;
• costs of purchase of other goods and services necessary to implement the project.

Co-financing of the project from the funds of the National Agency of Academic Exchange may amount to a maximum of PLN 300,000.   

Allocation of funds in the call is PLN 5,000,000.   

The Applicant may submit within the call not more than three applications regarding three separate projects.

Below is the link to the call documentation:

https://nawa.gov.pl/naukowcy/granty-interwencyjne-nawa/ogloszenie