The Africa Research Excellence Fund (AREF) will be holding its Essential Grant Writing Skills Workshop. Aimed at Sub-Saharan African women researchers who are emerging names in the fields of biomedicine and health, the workshop intends to help them build skills.
In addition, it shall focus on developing the women’s own research and fellowship proposals to the quality required in winning competitive international, regional, and national funding.
What Benefits are Included in the Workshop?
The Africa Research Excellence Fund Essential Grant Writing Skills Workshop shall help African women researchers by discussing the following topics:
- Developing and expressing the researcher’s own niche
- Formulating a compelling research question
- Creating deeper comprehension of funders’ requirements
- Strengthening their command of English in writing
- Writing the different sections of a proposal
- Identifying the key parts of a standard case for support or project description
- Planning a proposal project plan and budget
- Managing collaboration and teams
- Understanding and practicing peer review
- Preparing for a fellowship interview
Please do note that the workshop will not cover other basic grant-related topics, including:
- how to research ethics approval
- how to complete individual funders’ application forms
- the details of intellectual property management
- practice in research communication
While the workshop organizers will be using real funding applications for the lectures, they will not directly assist the women researchers with the particular proposals they are currently working on.
Other AREF Workshop Details
AREF does not provide funding for participants to access equipment or internet services with which to participate. Furthermore, the organization will not reimburse applications or their institutions for any other expenses associated with the program, as well as any form of per diem payment.
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On another note, the workshop series will be broken down into daily 3.5-hour online sessions. The talks are slated on September 13-17 and October 18-20, 10:00 am until 1:30 pm BST.
The African women participants will be provided with appropriate learning materials, including preparatory exercises. Consequently, each session will be delivered through Zoom or an equivalent platform. As such, the researchers will work in online groups and subgroups.
Meanwhile, application deadline for the Essential Grant Writing Skills Workshop is on July 8, 2021 at 4:00 pm BST.
Eligibility Requirements for AREF’s Essential Grant Writing Skills Workshop
To qualify for a spot in the workshop, the applicants must meet the following criteria:
- The women researchers must be a citizen of a Sub-Saharan African country.
- The African women researchers should have either been awarded a research doctorate (PhD/DPhil/MD) from a recognized academic institution within the previous 6 years or have a medical/clinical qualification plus a research-relevant master’s degree awarded within the previous 6 years.
- They must be presently employed in a recognized Sub-Saharan African university and/or specialist research institution.
- Aspiring qualifiers should not have already participated in equivalent proposal development and grant-writing trainings.
- A significant part of the researchers’ current employee role is to develop and conduct health research.
- Lastly, they must not already have a significant portfolio of international research grants, with a combined value of $300,000 or more.
AREF’s Essential Grant Writing Skills Workshop is welcome to all women in research who are actively working on challenges to human health and are trained and experienced in one or more of the following disciplines:
- Biomedicine
- physiology and pharmacology
- clinical sciences; epidemiology
- mathematics and statistics
- environmental health
- “one health” (veterinary science)
- behavioral, social and economic sciences
- and health policy and systems research
How Can African Women Researchers Apply?
In order to start your application, download AREF’s application form for the said workshop. Meanwhile, all other application requirements can be found on AREF’s Women in Research Essential Grant Writing Skills Workshop webpage.
Once you’ve accomplished everything, send the form and other necessary documents to aref@aref-africa.org.uk.
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