Call for Courses

General description

Under Task 7.3 of the GA of the CONCERT European Joint Programme, there will be an annual call for proposals to host short training courses.
The calls will be open to CONCERT Partners, Linked Third Parties of CONCERT and to every other Third Party, which is able to provide a 31% co-funding in cash in accordance with the co-funding rules for European Joint Programmes under Horizon 2020.

The purpose of the training courses is to:

• Provide education and training covering all aspects of the scientific research areas covered by CONCERT in order to attract new students and develop expertise in the field;
• Promote new science and technologies of value to the CONCERT research area;
• Take advantage of specialist expertise of the host institution.

Courses can be up to 3 weeks long, if justified by the content, and may be on (but not limited to) any of the following topics:

• Radiation epidemiology and molecular radiation epidemiology
• Emergency and recovery preparedness, and response
• Source term and dynamic ecosystem transfer
• Molecular radiation carcinogenesis
• Modelling low dose radiation effects from initial physical events
• Radiation effects in utero and human radiation genetics
• Environmental radiobiology and the ecosystem approach
• Non-targeted radiation effects, their role in low dose radiation risk
• New investigative techniques in radiation biology (tracer techniques, track analysis, synchrotron nano-micro techniques, microdosimetry, etc)
• Risk governance and stakeholder dialogue
• Individual monitoring for external exposures
• Individual monitoring and dose assessment for internal exposures
• Computational dosimetry
• Voxel Phantom Development and Implementation for Radiation Physics Calculations
• Practical use of European infrastructures with applications to the CONCERT research area

Proposals will be assessed by the Education and Training Committee (ETC, consisting of the 5 Task Leaders of Workpackage 7) on the basis of:

• Relevance and value of the topic and coverage to the aims of CONCERT
• Intended participant group
• Quality of course content and expected learning outcomes including introduction to the major infrastructures of the field
• Expertise of the host institution
• Practicality of the course arrangements

If the number of proposals exceeds the number that can be funded an objective points system (giving equal weight to the above categories) will be used to prioritise the applications. 
If a proposal does not meet any particular criterion, and funding is available, the ETC may negotiate amendments and possible modifications.

The final decision on which courses are funded, and by how much, will be made by the CONCERT Executive Board, taking account of the recommendations from the ETC.

Series 5 short-term training courses: invitation for proposals

Applications are invited for financial support to organise and teach a short course (sub-module) of duration from one to three weeks to be delivered between August 2019 and May 2020. Note the earlier end date because of the termination of CONCERT. The scheduling of the successful courses will be decided following the decision on the proposals (to be agreed between the course organisers). 

The proposed course may be either focused intensively on a single topic (of particular importance for advancing European research capability) or more comprehensive (for the purpose of extending the range of student research skills and promoting cross-discipline collaboration).  The length of the course should be justified by the content and purpose.

Applicants are strongly encouraged to incorporate the use of major European infrastructures within the course, or include a session on their applicability and use, as appropriate within the discipline of the course topic.

The course should be primarily directed towards students and scientists with an interest in active involvement in the CONCERT research areas.  Teaching and training should be at the level of a Master of Science course or PhD training programme. The course (sub-module) could consist of lectures, tutorials and practicals and should be typically designed for between 12 and 20 students.

If possible European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System (ECTS) credits should be awarded to participants on successful completion of the course.  However, this is not mandatory.

Applications must be made using the template annexed to this document. Please make sure you use the most recent version of the template.

Timetable:

Invitation: 01/04/2019

Deadline for submissions: 30/04/2019

ETC evaluation: 08/05/2019

ExB decision*: 22/05/2019

*This date may be subject to change if correspondence is required.

The proposal should be made by completing the enclosed proposal form including annexes I-II, following the instructions given on the template, and submitted to andrea [dot] ottolenghi [at] unipv [dot] it (andrea[dot]ottolenghi[at]unipv[dot]it) copy to concert [dot] training [at] unipv [dot] it (concert[dot]training[at]unipv[dot]it) by the deadline. All applicants will receive a receipt as acknowledgment of their application.

Financial details

Financial support from CONCERT will be available for personnel (additional PM of the beneficiary and/or honoraria and expenses of lecturers), use of facilities and consumables, travel and accommodation of external lecturers, and may offer reimbursement for travel and provision of accommodation for students.
The funding will be on the following basis:

• Actual eligible costs, as per application template
• Total budget will be co-funded at a rate of 31%;
• Co-funding may be in kind for CONCERT beneficiaries and Linked Third Parties, but other Third Parties must provide cash co-funding from an external source in accordance with H2020 rules;
• Maximum €6000 EC contribution per week when there is no laboratory work;
• Maximum €8000 EC contribution per week when the course includes laboratory work (as costed by the applicant);
• Maximum of €125,000 EC contribution is available for this course series.
• All expenditure must be completed by 31 May 2020 because of the termination of the CONCERT EJP on that date.

This distribution will be used as a reference, but the MB decision is not confined to follow these amounts strictly but will reserve the right to adjust the sums according to the proposals.

The applying project beneficiaries must fill in and attach to their proposal the budget templates (Annex I to the proposal form). Budgets may only include new costs (costs not already budgeted by this or some other beneficiary). If a common proposal with several beneficiaries is prepared, separate budgets for each beneficiary that will have costs are required. The budgets cannot be overlapping with each other if a common proposal is concerned. Normal EC financial rules and reimbursement rates (69%) apply also to new budgets.