RDA Europe offers up to five grants for experts to attend the 12th RDA Plenary meeting in Botswana. The purpose of the grants is to encourage and support participation of individuals who have a strong interest in RDA, and are drivers or adopters of one or more of the RDA outputs to enable data sharing by or from their project or organization.

The applicants should satisfy the following criteria:

• Experts are broadly defined as mid-career or senior data professionals / scientists;
• Be involved in RDA as active member, participant, chair, or contributor to a WG or IG, especially in the past 12 to 18 months;
• Contribute or be committed to RDA Recommendations or Outputs;
• Actively engage in Plenaries, national, and/or regional workshops and related initiatives;
• Have the ability to recruit collaborators across different segments of the European data community;
• Operate as an influencer within their Member State and is able to influence digital agendas on data;
• Be part of an active data community and have a good understanding of the European Data Infrastructures landscape, including initiatives such as the European Open Science Cloud; the FAIR movement; knowledge of the Open Science agenda, and how these intend to evolve in Europe;
• Reside/work in Europe

Further criteria and conditions:

• Previous Expert programme winners can apply, but should only apply in later rounds as consecutive plenary attendance will not be supported.
• It is not possible to apply for both the Expert support programme and the Early Career support programme in the same round.
• RDA Ambassadors are not eligible for the Expert support programme.
• Members of RDA governance bodies (TAB, OAB, Council & Secretariat) are not eligible for the Expert support programme.
• RDA Europe 4.0 project partners are not eligible for the Expert support programme. This exclusion refers to staff of the five project beneficiaries working directly on RDA Europe 4.0, not other staff of these institutions or members of the consortium who act as RDA Europe nodes.

The RDA EU expert programme was designed to support participation in RDA and its Plenary working meetings. Please note that all successful candidates will be expected to provide a report from the meeting in the form of a publishable summary or a blog as part of the grant assignment.

Candidates will be asked to submit an application that will be evaluated upon the following:

• A statement describing their interest in and commitment to the vision of RDA, in-progress Working/Interest Groups and/or one or more existing RDA Recommendations and Outputs; plans for future involvement and expected benefits;
• A summary of previous and current activities demonstrating their involvement and contributions to RDA related activities, Working/Interest groups, development and /or promotion and/or adoption of RDA Recommendations and Outputs;
• Wider engagement with other initiatives and/or national activities (and the national RDA node, if applicable) belonging to the European Data Infrastructures landscape, including initiatives such as the European Open Science Cloud; the FAIR movement; and/or initiatives on defining and implementing the Open Science agenda at national and European levels;
• Evaluation will also consider the following criteria to establish balanced and diverse distribution of the grants:
• Geographical balance
• Gender balance
• Preference to candidates that have not already previously received RDA funding
• Preference given to candidates in underrepresented fields within RDA

The Expert support programme will offer up to five grants of maximum €1800 to support participation to the Plenary meeting.
What costs can be reimbursed?
For reimbursement of Expert grants, the University of Göttingen cost accounting practices apply. The following costs are eligible:

• Flights, trains and public transport to and from the conference venue (Economy fares only)
• Maximum five nights accommodation in Gaborone, Botswana
• Hotel costs are reimbursed up to €102 per night (excluding breakfast)
• Conference fee (registration for International Data Week)
• Costs for Licensed Taxis are eligible if public transport is not available
• No daily allowance

Maximum total costs reimbursed will be €1800.

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How will costs be reimbursed?
Successful applicants will need to complete the form for ‘Travel expense reimbursement of invited/dispatched staff members’ from the University of Göttingen, and attach original receipts. This must be submitted to the University of Göttingen within 30 days after travel.
Contact: Dr. Daniel Bangert

Interested candidates are invited to complete the online application form by 30th August 2018, 17:00 CEST. All candidates will be notified of the outcome of their application on the 21st September 2018.

Please use the form linked below to submit your application. If you cannot see the form, please login / register.