After successful completion of the course, students are able to...

• describe basic principles of research funding;
• have an overview of major national public funding schemes;
• understand the major parts of a research project proposal application; 
• understand the reviewing process and the most common evaluation criteria;
• generate, visualize, and evaluate ideas for a research project proposal;
• express and focus their research ideas with an emphasis on novel aspects;
• write a good-quality research project proposal, either in basic or in applied research, depending on their research idea,
• analyze review and evaluation feedback by external jury members; and
• present their research project to a jury and analyze feedback from the hearing discussion.

These aspects of knowledge and capabilities ensure that participants are able to evaluate, develop, and present their future research project proposals.The objective of this course is to impart to the participants foundational knowledge and capabilities for effectively translating their research ideas into strong research project proposals for attaining national public funding.

• national funding schemes and their respective specifics
• idea generation, and parts of a proposal
• success criteria for a proposal
• reviewing process and revision of the proposal
• proposal presentation and defense

• self study & exercises
• presence days (obligatory!): group work, presentations, discussions, talks
• (dry run) proposal writing
• reviewing of proposals

The nature of this course makes it necessary to strictly limit the number of participants to 6 - 12. The selection will be based on a motivation letter that need to be submitted by participant candidates. See detailed admission information at https://www.tuwien.at/tu-wien/organisation/zentrale-services/forschungs-technologie-innovationssupport/forschungs-transfersupport/foerderberatung/prowriting-2020/

Selection of course participants will be masde according to ranking criteria, such as

• funding need,
• quality of the motivation letter,
• sufficient knowledge of state of the art,
• experience in (research project) proposal reading, writing, and evaluation
• availability of mentors in the target field of research (candidates should recommend mentors that they find relevant), and
• support letter by a faculty supervisor/mentor (plan for next proposal submission).

In addition there will be a waiting list from eligible candidates who may take the seat of a participant who drops out in an early phase of the course.

• Main weight is on the quality of the training proposal.
• For a positive grade, the proposal has to receive overall positive ratings.
• A participant will fail the course, if the proposal, even after one rework cycle, still does not achieve overall positive ratings.

For course enrollement, please go to: https://www.tuwien.at/tu-wien/organisation/zentrale-services/forschungs-technologie-innovationssupport/forschungs-transfersupport/foerderberatung/prowriting-2020/

Participants of this course are expected to have sufficient command of the state of the art to review and formulate novel research contributions to their field of research.