Alignment with the Nuffield Foundation’s priorities is vital for grant success
Top tips
- Ensure your research is aligned with the precepts and principles of the foundation
- Impact is vital but the foundation takes a broad and collaborative approach to assessing it
- Grants can be used for smaller projects as well as larger ones
- In both cases, showing that you have the right expertise and team to carry out the work is vital
Since its founding in 1943, the Nuffield Foundation has established itself as arguably the UK’s leading independent funder of research geared towards social policy in education, welfare and justice.
As a funder that has long had impact as a priority, the foundation says it seeks to fund rigorous research and encourage innovation to improve people’s lives.
The Nuffield Foundation’s central and longest-standing funding stream is the Research, Development and Analysis Fund, which is open now to outline applications, with a deadline of 14 October. It funds projects worth up to £750,000 for between six months and three years. Most grants are for sums of less than £300,000.
The foundation also runs more specialised funding streams, including the Racial Diversity UK Fund, which focuses on the future of UK society as shaped by migration from former UK colonies. The Racial Diversity UK Fund is also open now, with a deadline of 14 October.
All Research, Development and Analysis Fund applications must be relevant to at least one of the foundation’s three core interest areas (education, welfare, justice) and also to the UK context, even if that is in a comparative way.
Competition for these grants is usually tough, with only 15 per cent of outline applicants typically invited to send full proposals. Alex Beer, head of grants operations and portfolio development at the Nuffield Foundation, suggests how applicants can raise their chances of selection to the full application stage.
Are there any recent changes to the Research, Development and Analysis Fund that applicants should be aware of?
We have just simplified our outline application form. We are asking fewer questions, fewer words are required, and we have shortened our overall application timetable. Hopefully that means it is easier and quicker to apply.
What is your best advice to get over the threshold of the outline stage?
To get over the line, what I would advise is reading our guide for applicants and understanding where our priorities lie. We are interested in improving social wellbeing; we are interested in the way that disadvantage, vulnerability and inequalities play out in the areas of education, welfare and justice. So, aligning the research questions with our interests is absolutely key.
How do applicants signal a bid’s relevance to those areas?
There is a checkbox on the application form that says education, welfare or justice, but if the idea is cross-cutting, tick the box that is most relevant. Most applications are looked at by more than one person, and that will include people with interests across those areas. So, checking one box over another will not force the application into a silo.
What else is important?
We want to ensure there is that alignment with our priorities and a clear rationale for why the research question matters. Why is it relevant? Why is it needed?
We also want a clear methodology. We are interested in a wide range of methodologies; quantitative, qualitative, mixed-methods. The main focus for us is whether the proposed methods are suitable for answering the question that is being posed. And, finally, we want to understand how the research is going to make a difference and change lives. So, we will focus on impact.
How do you measure impact?
We have a broad definition but what is important is the project being able to ultimately deliver policy and practice change. We accept, however, that improving understanding and changing attitudes and behaviours are vital ways in which the research that we fund might make that difference.
We do not expect applications to aim for all of those, but to set out which dimensions of impact they might be able to make a difference with and then qualitatively how they will progress to do that.
We do take quite a qualitative approach to assessing impact, and we are open to how we do so. From the moment someone is funded by us, there will be a regular dialogue between us and them, with our aim being to support our grant holders to deliver that project and maximise impact.
What does the rest of the application process look like?
For the applicants we invite for the full application stage, we will set out some questions we have for them; some things that were not clear, some challenges we might have for them. We would expect the applicant to address those in their full application. If the applicant at that stage wanted a conversation about exactly what we meant by any of the questions, we are more than happy to discuss that.
The full application gets peer-reviewed, if it meets the quality threshold. All applications are returned to the applicant with the reviews and any additional commentary from us that we would like to see addressed. The applicants then have an opportunity to respond before the final decision.
Where are applicants usually based?
We fund a lot of research from think tanks and from universities, but we also fund research that is led by third sector organisations—for example, domestic violence charities or children and young people-centred justice organisations.
However, most of our funding goes to researchers based at universities. The current breakdown is 160 universities, 30 research policy institutions and nine charities, but provided the team has the necessary skills and expertise, then we are relatively neutral about where they are based.
What considerations come into play when assessing larger versus smaller applications?
One big question is, is your expertise sufficient to deliver what you are going to do? Grant applicants should highlight the strengths that are going to enable you to deliver the project.
I should add that although the Research, Development and Analysis Fund invites applications up to £750,000, we still welcome applications for smaller sums—say, between £20,000 or £50,000—where those sums are more appropriate. I would not put a limit on the amount depending on a researcher’s career stage because that is not the way the foundation thinks about it, but it might be that earlier career researchers are after smaller grant awards and they just need to demonstrate that their skills and experience are commensurate with what they are proposing.
We would expect the larger grants to answer more strategic questions than those posed by smaller grants, and for there to be more institutional involvement and more people and partners involved. There would also need to be an integrated and extensive engagement strategy.
This is an extract from an article in Research Professional’s Funding Insight service. To subscribe contact sales@researchresearch.com