Europeana Research Grants Programme: 2021 Call

The Europeana Research Grants programme awards funding for events that can bring together cultural heritage professionals and researchers. In 2021, part of the amount was allocated to special prizes.

The 2021 call is now closed.

Scope

Applicants are invited to submit proposals that 

• address challenges and opportunities related to the reuse of digital cultural heritage in research; 

• help build up the digital capabilities of cultural heritage professionals involved in cross-sectoral projects; 

• encourage collaborations between the cultural heritage and the research sectors. 

The Europeana Research Grants Programme is made possible by the European Commission's Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) Programme. The grants are intended for planning and organising:

• Conferences

• Workshops

• Series of seminars

• Summer/Autumn/Winter/Spring schools

• Training activities

In response to the COVID-19 outbreak and the digital shift it has imposed on Academia and Research, part of the annual budget will be allocated to special prizes (find more information below).

The theme of the 2021 call is Crowdsourcing & Research. 

In 2020 the European Commission published the Europeana Strategy 2020-2025, which presents crowdsourcing as one of the paths we are taking to improve metadata quality on the Europeana platform. In line with Europeana’s mission to empower the cultural heritage sector in its digital transformation, we want to also consider the perspective of cultural heritage institutions, for which crowdsourcing is both a way to enrich their digital collections and engage their communities of reference. 

While crowdsourcing is generally meant as a participatory method underpinning Citizen Science, we aim to move beyond this concept and consider the role that researchers can play both as contributors to crowdsourced projects and reusers of digital resources collected or enriched in this way.  As potential contributors of content, they may feel that their expertise is not adequately rewarded. As potential reusers of content, they may question its reliability.  

We welcome proposals for events that can help focus issues related to crowdsourcing and find constructive solutions to them, especially if these solutions come out from recent or ongoing experiences. More generally, the proposals must be relevant by reference to the framework defined by the EU’s strategies and programmes related to Research and Innovation. Possible topics include but are not limited to:

• Participatory research focusing on cultural heritage (e.g Public History)

• Data ownership, accountability and value in the context of crowdsourced research

• Re-creation / Re-contextualisation 

• De-colonising of metadata 

• Community generated metadata

• Post-custodial perspective

Proposals can address the field of cultural heritage in general or focus on one of its specific sectors (such as galleries, libraries, archives, or museums). They can also focus on challenges and opportunities for specific academic disciplines that use digital cultural heritage as a resource for research (for instance all the disciplines within the humanities, such as archaeology, history, linguistics, history of art and architecture).

The Research Grants Programme is intended for cultural heritage and/or research institutions, comprising universities and foundations. In line with the CEF Telecom call for proposals 2020 about Europeana, this call is open to institutions  based in one of the European Union’s member states, or in Iceland, Norway, and the UK. In case the proposal foresees the participation of more institutions, the institution in charge of the event must be based in one of the above mentioned countries. Please note that Europeana DSI-4 project partners are NOT eligible for this call. Check the list before applying.

• The Research Grants Programme benefits from the total amount of EUR 25,000 per year. This year, EUR 21,000 is allocated to in-person events and EUR 4,000 to special prizes (see the description here below). The funding for each proposal depends on the quality of the applications. The individual grants will support cultural heritage or research institutions interested in co-organising events with the Europeana Foundation.

• The applicant(s) will propose the thematic slant, the methodological approach, the timeline and a list of speakers. Their proposal should foresee the participation of Europeana representatives in the events and ensure the visibility of Europeana, as an initiative politically and financially supported by the European Commission. 

• The proposal should indicate the event's concrete outputs, such as reports, whitepapers, recommendations, training tutorials or video interviews. The outputs must be published under a CC open license (CC0, CC BY, CC BY-SA) and credit Europeana by using the Europeana Research logo in the produced text or video materials. If the outputs are in a language other than English, their original version must be accompanied by an English translation or, in the case of videos, by English subtitles.

• The Europeana Foundation will participate in the organisation by covering in full or in part the expenditure from the awarded grant, and will support promotion of the events and their outputs through its channels. The awarded institution(s) will be in charge of all the practical aspects of the event organisation. The event organiser(s) should regularly discuss the scientific aspects with the Europeana Foundation and inform it about the progress of the event programme (mainly, speakers and topics). We particularly encourage institutions to allow free entrance to the events.

The Europeana grant awarded is a gross amount and includes VAT and any other applicable taxes. The Europeana Foundation will transfer the amount to the bank account of the institution that will organise the event. To formally arrange the grant receipt, a representative of the main organising institution will be required to sign a contract with the Europeana Foundation. The awarded institutions have to organise their events between January and July 2022.

Applications must be in English and submitted by 31 May 2021, 23:59 CEST.

In their proposal, applicants will be asked to provide: 

• Details of the main organising institution and relevant contact information

• Details of the applicant/main contact person and his/her CV

• Five keywords and an abstract of their proposal (max. 200 words).

• A detailed proposal (max 1500 words),  which should mention: the state of play; the format, topic(s) and dates of the event; the target audience and the number of expected attendees; the delivery date; the expected outputs and their dissemination plan.

• A provisional list of speakers, a timeline and the allocation of the requested funding should be provided as annexes.

Applicants will find a form at the bottom of this page. They are asked to download, complete and upload it when applying.

The assessment and decision-making process is conducted by a committee composed of Europeana representatives and members of the Europeana Research Advisory Board. It consists of an initial screening against the eligibility criteria, a selection of shortlisted projects and a round of interviews. The committee will evaluate the eligible proposals with regard to their topic/content relevance, European dimension, methodological approach and innovation, and feasibility. The committee will propose a list in order of merit. The Europeana Foundation’s decision is final.

The COVID-19 pandemic has proven the value of digital transformation. Digital events have quickly replaced in-person ones, whenever possible. Universities have adapted their courses into online classes. In line with Europeana’s mission to develop expertise, tools and policies to embrace digital change, we want to award special prizes (EUR 2,000) to two cultural heritage professionals, professors or researchers willing to make video tutorials between October 2021 and March 2022. Prize recipients can also work in equipe and will be asked to send an offer of up to EUR 2,000 for a tutorial of three hours minimum, also distributed over a number of videos/units (e.g. one hour each). 

The aim of this initiative is to show how digital cultural heritage can support Higher Education (especially in the Humanities), facilitate interactive lessons, stimulate critical thinking and produce new knowledge with computational methods and digital tools. Proposals that foresee the reuse of Europeana resources and tools are particularly welcome. They can be domain-specific.  Before making the videos, the grant recipients should get the Europeana Foundation’s final approval on their content; nevertheless, ensuring the originality of the content is the sole responsibility of the grant recipients. The videos must be then published on Europeana Pro and research platforms - like DARIAH Campus - under one of the CC open licenses (CC0, CC BY, CC BY-SA) and credit Europeana by using the Europeana Research logo. The tutorials can be delivered in a language other than English; in this case, the video must be accompanied by English subtitles. The Europeana Foundation reserves the right to not publish the tutorials if the quality of the videos is not adequate from a technical point of view.  

The Europeana Foundation will run the decision-making process, in cooperation with the Research Advisory Board.

Applications must be in English and submitted by 31 May 2021, 23:59 CEST.

In their proposal, applicants will be asked to provide: 

• Details of the applicant / main contact person and his/her CV

• Five keywords;

• An abstract (max 100 words)

• A detailed proposal (max 900 words), which details the topic(s) and specifies the target audience and delivery date of the tutorial. 

• As an annexe, a description of the teaching units and the name(s) of the instructor(s), specifying their expertise in the field of digital cultural heritage, their experience in making tutorials (with possible links to resources already available), and the technical equipment that they would use to record the tutorial. 

Applicants will find an application form for the prizes at the bottom of this page. They are asked to download, complete and upload it when applying.

The Europeana Foundation will process applicants' data according to its privacy policy. If you have any concerns about the processing of your personal data, please contact us via info@europeana.eu.

We reserve the right to withhold a grant or a prize if false information is provided in the application form.