ESF after ESF What now?

A NEW CALLING The traditional mission of ESF (funding of cross-border collaborative research programmes and networks) has ended in December 2015 after 42 years of setting European research agendas The ESF governance has unanimously approved the continuation of the Association with a new remit, new service division name (Science Connect) and 3-year Business Plan This new Business Plan lays out the activities and science services that ESF has started to develop as of January 2016 with the aim of ensuring that they are executed with our usual level of quality The aim remains to promote scientific developments through collaborative actions, but with the emphasis shifting to helping research funding organisations carry out their decision making processes

ESF MEMBER ORGANISATIONS ESF is now an independent association of 13 Member Organisations research funding organisations research performing organisations academies and learned societies in 11 countries

SERVICES ESF’s aim is to serve the needs of the European research community and it is currently developing offers of services to science and research in Europe through: Peer review services Evaluation services Programme and Project Management Career Tracking Hosting Expert Boards and Committees Change

SERVICES Peer Review services for third parties Professional services to support competitive calls for proposals Modular approach: From external expert evaluation of proposals only to end-to-end management of competitive calls Approach tailored to the size and scope of the projects to be supported Why ESF? Integrity and independence Vast network of independent, highly-skilled reviewers Strong experience and know-how (ca. 3,000 research proposals evaluated in past 3 years) Quality controlled and optimised process and infrastructure Experienced scientific staff and efficient management of workflow processes  www.esf.org/peer-review

PEER REVIEW ACTIVITIES (1)

PEER REVIEW ACTIVITIES (2)

SERVICES Evaluation services Why ESF? Ex-ante evaluation (of programmes or schemes) Formative evaluation (activities or programmes) Ex-post evaluation and strategy (schemes, organisations, etc) Why ESF? Independence and neutrality of the ESF Tailored evaluation of proven quality Clear criteria and indicators based on European & international standards ESF is a privileged actor between Academia and funders A pool of over several thousand international Academics A large network of international high-level policy and evaluation experts  www.esf.org/evaluation

SERVICES Career Tracking Research Career Tracking and Monitoring services for surveys and studies Running joint international or national projects Tracking the quality of research training and skills Tracking to find out where researchers move in their careers Tracking for accountability and impact assessment CHANGE  www.esf.org/career-tracking

CAREER TRACKING 2nd PROJECT ESF has launched its 2nd CT services aimed at universities, RPOs, RFOs and philantropies Surveys to explore career trajectories of doctorate graduates of participating organisations To cover early career researchers whose PhD or equivalent was awarded by POs, up to 7 years after completion (at the R2 or R3 stage) Call launched on-line on 11 April 2016 – kick-off meeting October – Survey January-March – Report Summer 2017

PROJECT MANAGEMENT ESF has developed a strong expertise in project proposal development, project management and project coordination ESF has been involved as a key partner or Coordinator in several successful proposals within FP6, FP7 and H2020 In most cases, representatives from the scientific community and/or industry came to ESF to ask for coordination and/or project management support The ESF office offers its key expertise and know-how to scientific consortia set up for these projects in the areas of, e.g. proposal writing, financial and human resources management, networking, programme coordination, conference organisation and consensus-building

EC AND OTHER CONTRACTS ESF has gained a reputation since 2006 of high-quality coordination of contracts funded by the EC or other entities, acting as Coordinator, Project Office or Partner, and dealing with proposal and project coordination and management (setting-up of the consortia, proposal writing, project supervision and consortium coordination, administrative management) Partners comprise institutions but also industrial partners Currently running projects include: Graphene Flagship, MASE (space), Core1 (materials science) SCOPE (bridging the two EU Flagships Graphene and Human Brain ) ASTROMAP (space astrobiology), Mars Special Regions (planetary protection astrobiology), PPOSS (space planetary protection) BILAT-RUS (polar sciences), EUROFLEETS 2 (marine and polar sciences), SeaChange (marine science), AtlantOs (marine science) DEMOCRITOS (advanced nuclear space propulsion) EUROPLANET 2020-RI (planetary science) BIOWYSE (water treatment)

EXPERT BOARDS AND COMMITTEES Composed of high-level independent researchers or research managers to provide targeted expert advice in areas of science, policy, infrastructure, environment and society in Europe Committee on Radio Astronomy Frequencies (CRAF) European Marine Board (EMB) European Space Sciences Committee (ESSC) Materials Science and Engineering Expert Committee (MatSEEC) Nuclear Physics European Collaboration Committee (NuPECC) Other Boards or Virtual Institutes under discussion

NuPECC and ESF: a 29 year-long affair!

ESF – SCIENCE CONNECT Positioning Proposing our services to partners and members in a number of areas Relieving these partners from various “pains” linked to identifying appropriate funding opportunities defining projects scope assembling or expanding consortia writing or supporting the drafting of proposals acting as project office, technical coordinator or hosting house managing the financial and administrative aspects of projects while partners can concentrate on contents One main strength is our unique network of scientists and science stakeholders. This puts us in a good position to act as a go-between science and industry.

www.esf.org www.scienceconnect.eu