University of Michigan and The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation
2013-2014 Challenge Grant Competition Request for Proposals
DEADLINE: April 15, 2013
The Inter-‐university Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR), University of Michigan, is working with the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation to build community engagement in data citation and open access to data. To extend the impact of this project, ICPSR will fund a set of innovative small projects that focus on topics related to research data.
ICPSR expects to award three to five grants of up to $20,000 each.
Background
ICPSR and the Sloan Foundation seek to engage stakeholders – including journal editors, repositories, and funders -‐-‐ in salient issues related to data access and reuse. Specifically, our objectives are to:
- Establish clear and consistent citation of data in social science journals as a model for other disciplines
- Promote research transparency and replication of scientific results
- Foster and promulgate best practices for researchers in data management
- Optimize editorial workflows as they relate to data citation and open access requirements
- Develop common standards and solutions for digital repositories
- Propose ways that funding agencies can support data archiving activities
- Develop models for long-‐term sustainability of institutions that promote open access to
scientific data
Challenge Grant Suggestions
The Challenge Grant Competition invites proposals for projects that will contribute to the above objectives. Suggested activities include (but are not limited to):
- Training researchers in better data management practices
- Development of editorial workflows to manage and verify access to data underlying articles
- Research leading to a peer-‐reviewed paper on a pertinent topic in a major journal
- Research leading to a presentation on a pertinent topic at major conference
- Research on costs related to archiving
- Research on data replication practices
- Innovative business models for repositories
- Successful domain-‐specific archival strategies that have potential for other domains
Terms of Challenge Grant Funding
- Awards start on June 1, 2013, and end no later than May 31, 2014. No-‐cost extensions will not be allowed.
- ICPSR will fund up to a maximum of $20,000 in total costs per project. If indirect costs are included, the rate cannot be higher than 15 percent.
Selection Criteria
Applications will be evaluated by an Advisory Committee. Evaluation criteria include:
- Potential for improving current practices
- Impact on the community
- Innovation
- Applicability to multiple scientific domains
Reporting
A report summarizing the project, outcomes, lessons learned, and impact is required along with the invoice at the end of the p
