Image: Saaleha Bamjee [CC BY-SA 2.0], via Flickr
A scheme rewarding researchers pushing back against discrimination
With the cry for racial equality sounding ever louder, the Arts and Humanities Research Council’s equality, diversity and inclusion engagement fellowships pilot scheme is a timely call indeed. The fellowships, worth up to £100,000 over 12 months, aim to boost the exposure of arts and humanities researchers whose work has a significant dimension in equality, diversity and inclusion.
The AHRC will also work closely with the fellows, to learn from their research and scholarship. Four or five fellowships are planned, and the funding covers events, seminars, workshops, policy engagement, communication and knowledge exchange activities. The deadline is 10 September.
Dylan Law, head of cultural value and equality, diversity and inclusion at the research council, outlines the key features.
What do you hope to achieve through with this call?
First, we want to find ways to enact change through arts and humanities research. Second, we are looking to use the fellowships as an opportunity to learn from applicants and the people involved in their research.
What are the major differences with other AHRC schemes?
This is not a scheme aimed at the production of new research. This scheme is for academics who have got outputs that are already sitting within academia and have the potential to be taken outside the academy. We are expecting them to hit the ground running on the engagement side. If outputs are not ready to be moved into other arenas, or are not in a form that could be easily adapted for engagement, this call may not be for them.
Are there any differences in how the AHRC will operate?
One thing I hope comes through in this call—and which I hope academics will see as a positive—is that we will be in closer contact with these fellows than standard grantees. The term ‘fund and forget’ occasionally gets bandied about. This is not one of those sorts of schemes. It’s a scheme involving regular dialogue with fellows. We are looking to fund them not only for their expertise and excellent research but also for their contribution to our understanding and how this can inform our funding policies.
What are the essential elements that bids should include?
We want to see a really strong commitment from the partners involved in each of the fellowships, as well as the institutions and research organisations. It needs to be really clear how this scheme is enabling them to deliver some part of their wider public, community or stakeholder engagement strategies. Are they using these awards to kickstart some kind of sustainable relationship with the communities they are interested in working with?
What level of experience should fellows have?
Fellows are expected to have substantial outputs already available, but we also want to see them working with more junior academics in their department or institution, or outside the university system, so they can learn from each other’s experiences. We are focusing on trying to get this scheme to recognise the contribution of everyone involved in the project. It’s not about saying: ‘This is a star academic—look at what you can learn from them.’
Do you have any preferences for areas of focus?
Not really. We’ve deliberately not limited the call to the protected characteristics under the Equality Act 2010. There are equality, diversity and inclusion challenges for groups that maybe don’t recognise themselves within those characteristics, or who straddle a number of characteristics in interesting ways. On the other hand, we want to make sure we are funding a diverse portfolio of awards, so we may need to think about how we balance the portfolio of fellowships.
Can bids promote best practice rather than focus on identifying challenges?
Yes. While we acknowledge that this is a really emotive area that is full of challenges and barriers, we also want to encourage positive and celebratory cases as well. For example, if you’re doing a history project focusing on a certain type of community, then there could be stories and approaches that work well and could be encouraged—we’re interested to hear about that as well.
How mature should stakeholder relationships be?
We are expecting a lot of relationship-building with necessary stakeholders to have happened already. If not, it could potentially undermine the success of the fellowship. For example, if you are planning on doing a seminar in partnership with the UN, make sure you have explored the feasibility of that happening already rather than building in time for complex negotiations.
Is there a plan for this scheme in the long term?
Absolutely. We are doing a lot of development work about how best to realise our ambition for equality, diversity and inclusion to become a research area in its own right rather than being an element of other kinds of research.
This is an extract from an article in Research Professional’s Funding Insight service. To subscribe contact sales@researchresearch.com