This UNIC Seed Fund Initiative aims to support collaborative "Engaged Research" initiatives across our partner universities, sparking new ideas for tackling societal challenges in post-industrial cities.
On this page, you can learn about what Engaged Research means, what qualifies for seed funding, and how to apply. Timelines, application forms, and the fine print are all below. You can find additional information in downloadable PDFs. If you have further questions regarding the call, please reach out to UNIC coordinator(s) in your host institution.
↓ Download the full Seed Fund Call details (ZIP, 2 MB)
↓ Download the Engaged Research information pack (PDF, 1.1 MB)
↓ Download the Local Engaged Research Roadmap (PDF, 1.9 MB)
The European University of Post-Industrial cities (UNIC) is an alliance of ten universities impacting education, research, and community engagement to develop post-industrial cities. The UNIC Alliance is located in transitory economies and places that constitute a shared socio-economic environment of post-industrial transformations. Our universities are expected to play a key role in the transition of their cities to become centres of knowledge concerning transformations by engaging with research into the very processes and learning on resilience, adaptation, co-creation, etc.
UNIC researchers tackle societal challenges by involving and engaging citizens, civil society, public/city authorities, and private businesses in research and innovation activities. Engaged Research offers an interdisciplinary approach and method for systematic knowledge production not only for society but also together with society.
In order to increase the amount of collaborative engaged research initiatives within the UNIC consortium and provide support to researchers to coordinate those initiatives, seed funds are allocated to the members of the Alliance.
“UNIC4ER Seed Fund” offers small-scale support for engaged research collaboration and project development across all disciplines. This support should be considered as:
— A complementary resource to coordinate a collaborative project/initiative (such as an application for external funding for Research, development, or innovation project)
— An initial resource to implement an activity aimed at establishing a new collaborative initiative among UNIC partner universities that will help to develop a novel and solid research path, which could also be supported by an external grant afterward.
The seed fund program is open to all UNIC faculty and research faculty members (professors (of all levels), postdoctoral researchers, and Ph.D. candidates).
Approved proposals will be supported for at most 12 months with a budget according to the additional information provided by your university.
We recommend first contacting the UNIC coordinator in your host institution for local guidance. In general, the following documents should be submitted as a single PDF file: