Internal Competition: Early Resarcher Award Round 10

MEMORANDUM

Date:              April 18, 2014                  

To:                  Faculty, Chairs and Deans           

From:             Umed Panu, Associate Vice-President (Research, Economic Development, and Innovation)       

Subject:          Early Researcher Award - Internal Competition

 

In the past Lakehead University has been successful in securing awards through the previous rounds of the Ministry of Research and Innovation (MRI)’s Early Researcher Award (ERA) program.  The purpose of this program is to help promising, recently-appointed Ontario researchers build their research teams of undergraduates, graduate students, post-doctoral fellows, research assistants, associates, and technicians.  

Lakehead University invites early career researchers who meet the ERA program criteria, to apply to the 2014 internal ERA competition.  You are eligible to apply for this award if you:

  • are a full-time faculty member or principal investigator at an eligible research institution
  • started your independent academic research career no more than 5 years ago (as of July 1, 2013)
  • completed your first PhD, DVM or MD no more than 10 years ago (as of July 1, 2013)
  • have not already held an Early Researcher Award
  • are not a Tier 1 Canada Research Chair.

Researchers may receive only one ERA during their career.  To be competitive, researchers are encouraged to be actively involved in conducting research that has been supported by peer-reviewed funding and to demonstrate academic independence from previous supervisors.

Under this program, an award to a leading researcher is worth a maximum of $100,000 and must be matched by an additional $50,000. For this competition, Lakehead University will provide the required matching contribution of $50,000 ($10,000 per year over 5 years) towards one application. If researchers, however, are able to access funds from other sources to meet the matching requirement, Lakehead will consider submitting more than one meritorious ERA application. Please note that awards administered by the federal granting councils (Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council, Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council) are not eligible partner contributions.

Notices of intent (NOI), using the MRI form, are due in the Office of Research Services no later than May 23, 2014 (this is required in order for the applicant to be registered with MRI). Full ERA applications are then due internally in the Office of Research Services no later than July 11, 2014 and will be reviewed by the Lakehead University Senate Research Committee (SRC) to determine which application will be submitted to the ERA program.  

In addition to the required ERA application form and attachments, researchers are required to provide three original signed letters of reference in sealed and signed envelopes clearly marked with “ERA reference for (insert applicant’s name on envelope)”.  These sealed envelopes should be put inside another bigger envelope addressed to the Office of Research Services, Lakehead University (955 Oliver Road, Thunder Bay, Ontario, P7B 5E1).  One additional copy of the reference letters should be sent by fax (807-346-7749) or e-mail (ahacquo1@lakeheadu.ca) to the Office of Research Services or included in the application package for the purpose of Lakehead’s internal review. 

For a complete list of ineligible partner contributions, eligible expenses, evaluation criteria, application forms and letter of reference requirements, please see the ERA program guidelines found at:  http://www.ontario.ca/business-and-economy/funding-academic-research-early-researcher-awards