Royal Society’s University Research Fellowship – changes to the scheme

The Royal Society’s University Research Fellowship scheme is now open with a funder deadline of 7th September 2023. This year’s scheme has changed, in line with the Royal Society’s Grant Funding Guidance which was published earlier this year.

The main changes are:

• Introduction of a maximum grant value - applicants can now apply up to a maximum award value over eight years (£1.83 million for the 2023-2024 round)
• The annual ‘caps’ on salary and research expenses have been removed to enable greater flexibility for grant holders
• A minimum expected level of salary for the Fellow has been introduced
• Minimum expected levels of research expenses have also been introduced, although lower levels may be included but must be justified
• Inflation is to be included for the full duration of the grant and the level of inflation must be justified

The Scheme Notes and Grant Funding Guidance must be read together, as key information is distributed between both documents. For example, their stipulated costs for PhD stipends and fees are only detailed in the Grant Funding Guidance and not mentioned in the Scheme Notes.

A crib sheet and new X5 Scheme will be available w/c 31st July 2023. Any costings already in X5 will need to be updated once the scheme is released into X5, to ensure inflation and studentships are captured appropriately.