The evaluation and selection process is based on an open, fair and transparent competition between the applicants, fully complying with the Guidelines of the European Code and Charter for Researchers.
The whole process is expected to last about 3 months after the call deadline, and will consist of 5 stages from an initial check to completeness to the public announcement of the call outcome.
It consists in detail of:
- Stage 1 (if applicable): Ethical issues check
If any ethical issues will be declared by the candidate, a review from an internal ethics committee chaired by an external expert with appropriate skills on ethics, will be required.
Please note that the ethical review could be put in place also if any ethical issues, not declared by the candidate, will be noted at any stage of the evaluation process.
- Stage 2: Independent expert review
Eligible applications will be forwarded to the Selection Committee (SC). The Chair of the SC will assign at least 3 independent experts, chosen among the SC members, to each application, based on the keywords indicated by the candidates to describe their research projects.
First, the experts will independently numerically score and comment applications on the basis of scientific excellence of the candidate, scientific and technological quality of the proposed project and feasibility of implementation. Scores will be a fair reflections of the comments, balancing strengths and weaknesses, and comments will give sufficient and clear reasons for the scores. Scores will be a fair reflections of the comments, balancing strengths and weaknesses, and comments will give sufficient and clear reasons for the scores.
Then, for each assigned application, the experts will provide an evaluation summary report containing the awarded overall and individual criteria scores and comments, commonly agreed by them during a consensus meeting.
For more information on evaluation criteria and scores please refer to the Section Criteria for the evaluation of fellowship applications.
- Stage 3: Ranking
When all expert reviews will be terminated, the SC will produce a ranked list of applications scoring above set threshold based on the awarded total score and will recommend the 15 successful applications, and applications to be rejected or placed on the waiting list.
- Stage 4: Communication of results
The results will be communicated by January 15th 2019 by the Coordination Board. The candidates will receive a communication on the outcome of the evaluation and the Evaluation Summary Report by email.
The 15 applicants who have been recommended for funding by the SC will receive an ‘Offer-to-Hire’ email together with the Evaluation Summary Report in January 2019. It is therefore important that all applicants have access to their email during this period. The offer must be accepted within 10 calendar days of receipt.
Applicants rejecting the offer or failing to return the communication of acceptance within the prescribed timeframe forfeit their offer and the next highest-ranking applicant will be offered the Fellowship instead.
- Stage 5: Public announcement of results
When all available position have been filled the names and short biographies of the successful candidates, now known as FELLINI Fellows, will be posted on the FELLINI website.