The world needs research. Research needs women.
L’ORÉAL Austria, in collaboration with the Austrian National Commission for UNESCO, in cooperation with the Austrian Academy of Sciences, and with financial support from the Federal Ministry for Women, Science, and Research, awards grants to young female researchers in basic science in the fields of medicine, the natural sciences, or mathematics to carry out projects in Austria.
The grants are each endowed with €25,000 and are non-divisible. The awards are presented in cooperation with the Austrian Academy of Sciences.
This Austrian initiative is intended as a national extension of the joint, global commitment by L'ORÉAL and UNESCO to recognize women’s contributions to research and to remove career barriers for female scientists. The grants are intended to support talented young female scientists who have already demonstrated their qualifications through notable publications.
These grants are intended to support promising young female researchers who have demonstrated their qualifications through notable publications. The objective is to support female researchers who completed their doctoral/PhD studies no more than four years ago.
In particular, the grant is intended for the following cases:
The project must be carried out in Austria; short project-related stays abroad are permitted.
Applications for the development of a research project for a third-party funding application are also possible if the doctoral/PhD program has not yet been completed by the submission deadline, provided it will be completed by May at the latest, i.e., approximately four weeks before the decision on the award of the fellowship (in June/July). In this case, the planned date of completion must be stated in the application.
25,000 euros
The awards are each endowed with €25,000 and are indivisible. They are presented in cooperation with the Austrian Academy of Sciences.
Young female scientists in medicine, the natural sciences, or mathematics are invited to apply for the L’ORÉAL Austria Award if they
Exceptions
Delays (up to a maximum of 3 years) due to (child) care responsibilities, chronic illness, or disability will be taken into account. Exceptions must be clarified prior to application by consulting with the ÖAW’s Scholarships & Awards Department.
The selection committee consists of scientists working at a university or a non-university research institution in Austria. Committee members are nominated by the Austrian Academy of Sciences.
The selection process for the L’ORÉAL Austria Awards takes approximately 4–5 months. The selected awardees will be notified in writing following the selection committee’s decision (usually in mid-July).
The decision is final and not subject to legal appeal.
The primary selection criterion is the excellence of the applicant’s current and past research, as well as her plans for future research. The applicant’s scientific qualifications, the innovative content and methodology of current and future research approaches, and the feasibility of the planned project are evaluated.
Applications are assigned to members of the award committee according to their respective fields of expertise. Strict attention is paid to potential conflicts of interest. This means, first of all, that committee members and applicants may not be affiliated with the same university or research institution. In addition, potential professional or personal ties or competitive relationships are taken into account.
In the first round of selection, the award committee decides which applications will undergo external review. If the committee concludes that an application does not meet the criteria of the funding program, it is rejected.
For applications that undergo external review, committee members propose suitable reviewers who are active abroad. During the selection process, strict attention is paid to potential conflicts of interest or bias.
There is no fixed pool of reviewers; for each application, experts are sought who can evaluate the proposal based on their own scientific experience or research activities in accordance with international standards in the respective field. These reviewers work on a voluntary basis, meaning they receive no financial compensation for this work.
Applicants have the right (e.g., for competitive reasons or due to a school dispute) to exclude up to three scientists from the review process without providing a reason.
At least one review is obtained for each application under the L’ORÉAL Austria program. For interdisciplinary applications covering multiple research areas, this number may be increased.
An evaluation consists of a written statement as well as a formal assessment of the applicant’s scientific qualifications and specific aspects of the research project on a scale of 1–10 (1–2 = insufficient, 9–10 = excellent):
Finally, the reviewers are asked to provide a summary recommendation as to whether the application is fully eligible for funding or should be rejected.
If the written statement is not conclusive, a second review will be requested. The reviewers are asked to disclose any potential conflicts of interest. If a conflict of interest is discovered after the fact, the review will not be considered.
The decision on the selection of the award recipients is made during the award meeting.
Based on the expert opinions, the committee members rank the applications assigned to them and present this ranking to the committee. The applications are evaluated in comparison; in this process, the expert opinions, as well as criteria regarding the applicant’s academic qualifications (such as publication record, mobility, etc.) and the significance of the award for the applicant’s future academic career, are discussed in detail.
The decision on the awarding of the grants is made by the entire committee.
Implementation of the submitted project may begin from the time the relevant candidate is notified of the award decision until the end of the current year.
The awardees agree to be photographed for public communications and to attend the award ceremony (in October/November). If events specifically planned for and with them are scheduled within 12 months of the award ceremony (up to two), they are expected to participate. They may also be filmed and interviewed for non-commercial purposes in connection with the communication of the L’ORÉAL-UNESCO “For Women in Science” program.
These photos, videos, and texts may be used for written and audiovisual publications as well as for dissemination in Austrian and international media. A written consent form for image rights must be signed by each award winner.
By submitting an application for a L’ORÉAL Austria grant, these obligations are accepted.
No later than 3 months after completion of the project awarded the grant, a final report must be sent via email to both the Austrian National Commission for UNESCO (walder-wintersteiner(at)unesco.at) and the Scholarships & Awards Department of the Austrian Academy of Sciences (stipref(at)oeaw.ac.at).
Please apply only via: https://stipendien.oeaw.ac.at/stipendien/loreal-oesterreich/loreal-antrag
Further information:
https://stipendien.oeaw.ac.at/stipendien/loreal-oesterreich
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