Future Fellowships

Critical Dates

Now Open

Submission of NOI to UoM for FT24

5 October 2023

FT24 Applications open in RMS

Monday 23 October 2023

FT24 Eligibility Exemption Request due to RIC (if applicable)

Late October 2023

FT23 Establishment Grant requests due (see 'Establishment Grants for Future Fellowships' heading for further details)

Wednesday 25 - Friday 27 October 2023

FT24 Submit review ready application to RIC

TBA

FT24 Request not to assess due to RIC (if applicable)

TBA

FT24 Request not to assess due to ARC (if applicable)

9am, Monday 20 November 2023

FT24 Final Application Submission due to RIC

Thursday 23 November 2023

FT24 Final Applications due to ARC

TBA

FT24 Rejoinders open and close

25 July - 7 August 2024

FT24 Outcomes

Overview

Future Fellowships reflect the Australian Government’s commitment to excellence in research by supporting excellent mid-career researchers to undertake high quality research in areas of national and international benefit

The Future Fellowships scheme objectives are to:

  • support outstanding mid-career researchers, with demonstrated capacity for high-quality research, leadership, research training and mentoring;
  • support excellent basic and applied research by outstanding mid-career researchers to be recruited and retained by universities in continuing academic positions;
  • foster national and international research collaboration;
  • support excellent and innovative research that addresses a significant problem or gap in knowledge and represents value for money;
  • create new or advanced knowledge resulting from the outcomes of the research with economic, commercial, environmental, social and/or cultural benefits for Australia, and enhances the scale and focus of research in Australian Government priority areas.

ASSESSMENT CRITERIA

  • Investigator/Capability: 50%
  • Project quality and innovation: 25%
  • Benefit: 15%
  • Feasibility and strategic alignment: 10%

FUNDING

The scheme provides Future Fellow’s salary (including 30 per cent on-costs) at one of three salary levels, and project funding (up to $60k per year) for four years. Project funding can be used to hire research personnel, support HDR students, project equipment (and its maintenance) and consumables, field research (including fieldwork related travel and accommodation), travel costs essential to the project ($100k limit on project total, excluding fieldwork), and other project specific costs (e.g. access to archives, databases, publication costs, web hosting and development). See Grant Guidelines for more information.

ESTABLISHMENT GRANTS FOR FUTURE FELLOWSHIPS

Establishment Grants are internal University of Melbourne grants that support ARC Future Fellowship recipients at the university. To be eligible for Chancellery support, matching funding must be provided by the host department/school/faculty on a 1:1 basis. Applications for Establishment Grants should be requested at the ARC Future Fellowship application stage. Each faculty has their own internal requirements to apply for this grant. Refer to (to be updated for FT24) Establishment Grants for ARC Future Fellows for details on how to apply.

D3 STATEMENT BY THE ADMINISTERING ORGANISATION

IMPORTANT: It is mandatory for your ‘D3 Statement by the Administering Organisation’ to be submitted for review and approval. As this is an official statement from the university, a final version needs to be officially approved through RIC before it is uploaded it into RMS.

The requirements for review vary depending on faculty. Please view your faculty requirements (to be updated for FT24) here. When drafting your statement, you must use the university approved template and consult the university guide (these two documents can be accessed below under Supporting documents > RIC Documents and Resources).

SCHEME LIMITS

Candidates may be nominated for a Future Fellowship three times over the period in which they are eligible. This includes applications that are withdrawn after the grant closing date or those that are deemed ineligible.

For information regarding project limits under the ARC Discovery Program please consult the Grant Guidelines.

ACTIVE PROJECT AND ACTIVE PROJECT ASSESSMENT DATE

An Active Project refers to an ARC Project that is receiving funding according to the terms of an existing Funding Agreement or grant agreement, or has any carryover funds approved by the ARC, or an approved variation to the Project’s end date. Therefore, if a project has carried forward any funding and the end date has changed, the NEW end date determines if the project is active. Active projects can be viewed via the applicants RMS profile by selecting Person Profile > Current ARC Projects> End Date. Please note that projects with Final Reports due are not considered active projects.

The Active Project Assessment Date is a date on which active project eligibility will be considered for project and application limits per named participant.

A named participant can be concurrently funded through the Discovery Program for a maximum of:

  • two projects as a Chief Investigator (CI); or
  • one ARC Fellowship and one project as a CI; or
  • one ARC Fellowship or project if the individual is also a Director on an active ARC Centre of Excellence and/or a Special Research Initiative project.

If a Future Fellowships application is successful, named participants must meet the above project limits before the project can start. Project limits can be met by relinquishing existing active project(s), or relinquishing role(s) on existing active projects, or withdrawing application(s) that would exceed the project limits. This may not need to occur until all applications are announced.

Important dates for FT24 grant round:

  • Grant Commencement Date: 1 July 2024
  • Active Project Assessment Date: 1 January 2025

For example: A Future Fellowship candidate can apply for a FT24 while holding two active Discovery Projects (DPs) as at the FT24 Active Project Assessment Date, but must relinquish a DP (or their CI role on that Project) if the FT24 application is successful, in order to meet the limit of one ARC Fellowship and one project as a CI. If one or both of these projects have an end date before the FT24 Active Project Assessment Date the fellow will not be required to take further steps to ensure their eligibility.

RESEARCH OUTPUTS

Research outputs must first be added to an applicant's ARC Research Management System (RMS) profile before they can be selected for inclusion on an application. The University's recommended approach is to export research outputs from Elements as a BibTeX file and then import this file into RMS to achieve best data integrity.

Please contact your local Faculty Research Office or research-outputs@unimelb.edu.au for help with the process or to amend data in Elements.

Further esources to assist with managing Research Outputs are available below under Supporting documents > Research Outputs.

REQUEST NOT TO ASSESS

If you have a conflict of interest with a researcher from an external institution it is possible to request that they not be considered as a potential detailed assessor for your application. More details about this can be found on the ARC Request Not to Assess webpage.

How to apply

  1. Submit a Notice of Intent (NOI).

    The NOI should be completed early to provide RIC with the Future Fellowship candidate's contact details to ensure the candidate receives important updates regarding the scheme. There is no deadline for submission of the NOI.

  2. Update RMS profile

    Obtain access to RMS and update profile information (see RMS information)

  3. Review documentation

    Review the Grant Guidelines and the Instructions to Applicants.

  4. Complete the draft application in RMS

    Log on to RMS to complete the draft application.

  5. Statement by the Administering Organisation

    Work on the Statement with your supervisor and department/faculty.  Please see review instructions (including review submission dates) for each Faculty here.

  6. Academic Level Justification Letter

    If applicable, work on the Academic Level Justification Letter with your supervisor and department/faculty. This Letter must be sent to ric-arcdiscovery@unimelb.edu.au at the same time as the Statement by the Administering Organisation so that RIC can arrange for the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research) (DVC(R)) to certify it.

  7. Eligibility Exemption Request

    If applicable, complete the Eligibility Exemption Request form. This is a spreadsheet that details career interruptions for applicants whose PhD was awarded prior to the FT24 eligible PhD award date of 1 March 2009. The form is available here.

    This form must be sent to ric-arcdiscovery@unimelb.edu.au by Monday 23 October 2023 so RIC can arrange for the DVC(R) to certify eligibility.

  8. Submit review ready application to RIC

    See the Submission Procedure webpage for information on review ready applications.

    Submit application to RIC (ric-arcdiscovery@unimelb.edu.au) within the RIC submission period. Submit the following:

    • An electronic copy of the 'review ready' application*, downloaded as a PDF from RMS.
    • Applicants from Architecture, Building and Planning; Arts; Law; and Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences, please also send your Statement by the Administering Organisation in a Word document (using the template letterhead provided below). (Applicants from other faculties will have their statements reviewed by their faculties - see here for details .
    • Academic Level Justification letter, if applicable. Use the template letterhead provided under Support Documents > RIC. This letter needs to be included in your application. Please note this is only required if you have selected 'Other' at question F15 within the Future Fellowship application because you do not currently have an Australian academic level or you have chosen a salary level in Part E of the Future Fellowship application which does not align with the academic level that you are currently employed at (due to a significant career interruption).

    *A 'review ready' application

    • RMS Profile for personnel - should be updated because some parts of the application are auto-populated from the RMS profile
    • Part A - Administrative Summary
    • Part B - Classifications/Statistical Info
    • Part C - Project Eligibility
    • Part D - Project Description: This part can be incomplete, but should include Investigator/Capability, Benefit  and Communication of Results sections in D2.
    • Part E - Project Cost
    • Part F - Participant Details including ROPE

  9. Request Not To Assess

    If applicable, the applicant should complete the Request Not to Assess in RMS if they would like to request the exclusion of a potential assessor. Submit  this to the Research Office in RMS by (TBA) date.

  10. Application review

    Two RIC staff members will review the application and provide the applicant with feedback via email.

  11. Complete the application

    After taking feedback from the RIC team into consideration, complete the application in RMS. It is suggested advice is sought from colleagues, Faculty mentors, etc. before finalising the application.

  12. Submit the UOM Authority to Submit form

    The Authority to Submit form must be submitted to RIC via email to ric-arcdiscovery@unimelb.edu.au by 9am Monday 20 November 2023. This form should include:

    • The Head of Department certification
    • The applicant must read through the submission conditions and sign their initials next to each one to confirm that they have been met

    Electronic signatures are permitted.

    This is an ARC requirement and the application cannot be submitted to ARC until the Authority to Submit form is received.

  13. Final submission

    By 9am Monday 20 November 2023, the applicant must:

    • Submit final application by clicking ‘Submit to Research Office’ in RMS.
    • Email RIC (ric-arcdiscovery@unimelb.edu.au) a pdf copy of the final application and a scanned, signed Authority to Submit form.

    Note: Applications without a completed Authority to Submit form cannot be submitted to the ARC.

  14. RIC will submit the application

    Once the application has been submitted to the ARC, you will receive an email from RIC confirming submission.

Supporting documents

ARC Documents and Resources

RIC Documents and Resources

(UoM login required for some of the following documents/links. Please email ric-arcdiscovery@unimelb.edu.au or your faculty research office if you require copies)

Research Outputs

Seminars

Rejoinders

Note: Assessor comments should only include details on Investigator/Capability, Project Quality and Innovation, Benefit, and Feasibility. Assessors should not be commenting on Eligibility and Compliance. If you identify an assessment that contains inappropriate elements you may wish to have this reviewed by the ARC. You can do this by completing an ARC Assessment Review Request form within 3 working days after the opening of the Rejoinder period. Please note that applicants should never contact the ARC directly. Always speak to your Faculty or RIC first.

Contacts

Future Fellowships questions and primary email
ric-arcdiscovery@unimelb.edu.au

Key Contacts

Leah Sullivan

Carrie Liang

+61 3 8344 2012

+61 3 8344 0440