A study about the career paths of applicants for and researchers awarded a grant of the European Research Council (ERC) shows different evaluation standards across Europe and that the major themes are dual careers.

The European Research Council’s (ERC) peer review evaluation process has been carefully designed to identify scientific excellence irrespective of the gender, age, nationality or institution of the applicant. Despite these efforts, persistent inequalities exist between men and women scientists in ERC funding success as well as other career outcomes. One idea is to allow unconventional careers into the program.
As it turned out, applicants face the dilemma to disclose parental status / leave / part-time in a grant application, because this may induce a sense of entitlement but also stigma for the applicant.
The authors of the study give several recommendations and concluding with “we recommend that the ERC incentivizes employer excellence by promoting dual career policies, compensation policies for time to care for applicants and grantees, and accreditation such as the Athene Swan system.”

PDF “Capturing career paths of ERC grantees and applicants: Promoting sustainable excellence in research careers” by Claartje Vinkenburg et al., ERCAREER ERC-Support-2012-1 (317442) Final Report – short version (June 2014).

The study was presented by Claartje Vinkenburg  at the conference of the Swiss National Science Foundation on 22 October 2014. Read more…