Partnership Engage Grants COVID-19 Special Initiative

Description

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has posed unprecedented challenges globally. While much needed focus to date has been on developing and testing effective countermeasures to control the spread of the virus, examining the longer-term impacts of the pandemic—and the ensuing economic slowdown—on individuals, businesses and communities is just as important.

Social sciences and humanities research, including Indigenous research, both in disciplinary and multidisciplinary approaches, can help shed light on the nature of these impacts. It can also build knowledge on the potential strategies for managing recovery efforts, addressing systemic inequalities in our societies, and building resilience to handle later waves of the pandemic as well as other emergencies.

Working in partnership with government, industry and not-for-profit organizations, researchers from across the social sciences and humanities can help provide the data, insight and evidence to guide action in the months and years to come.

There are a wide range of ways social sciences and humanities researchers can contribute: from highlighting the lessons of history, to probing individual and group behaviour, to exploring possible responses in policy and practice in all sectors.

SSHRC encourages projects in, but not limited to, the following themes:

• Understanding the differentiated social impacts of a pandemic, like COVID-19, using Gender-Based Analysis Plus (GBA+), or by analyzing its political and economic effects at a regional, national or global scale.
• Designing and implementing effective and equitable recovery measures, such as fiscal and monetary policies, supply chain management measures, and social protection and employment creation initiatives.
• Building longer-term resilience and disaster preparedness, for instance, by learning from Indigenous knowledge systems, developing new emergency, public communication and work environment plans, or by rethinking communal and pedagogical approaches, artistic models and rituals.

Through Partnership Engage Grants (PEG), the PEG COVID-19 Special Initiative provides short-term and timely support for small-scale, stakeholder-driven partnerships. It will allow researchers and their partners to address urgent and specific needs, challenges or opportunities through collaborations. It will also provide a unique opportunity to foster a knowledge exchange on COVID-19 crisis related issues, challenges and impacts between postsecondary researchers and different sectors of society, including graduate students, postdoctoral researchers and other highly qualified personnel.

Value and duration

SSHRC is committed to investing up to $1.5 million over the next two PEG competitions to support COVID-19 related projects, at a maximum amount of $25,000 per project for one year.

Due to the exceptional circumstances of the COVID-19 pandemic, the effective date of the grant will be retroactive to April 1, 2020, for the June and September 2020 competitions. In this way, expenses incurred on funded projects before the grant is awarded can be reimbursed from the funds allocated under the PEG COVID-19 initiative.

Eligibility

PEG COVID-19 Special Initiative applications are subject to the general PEG eligibility requirements.

Due to the exceptional circumstances of the COVID-19 pandemic, the following exceptions apply:

• organizations or associations that provide services to postsecondary institutions may be involved as a partner;
• researchers who have already submitted a PEG application in the current calendar year are eligible to apply for a PEG COVID-19 grant; and
• researchers can hold one PEG grant and multiple PEG COVID-19 grants simultaneously.

Researchers may only submit one application to either PEG or the PEG COVID-19 Special Initiative in the same competition (e.g., June 2020).

Application process

Applicants must complete the PEG application form, and follow the accompanying instructions, as outlined in the PEG funding opportunity description.

SSHRC will accept applications for the PEG COVID-19 Special Initiative for the following deadlines:

• June 15, 2020
• September 15, 2020

In their application form, applicants must:

• insert the prefix “COVID-19” in the application title;
• under Keywords, include “COVID-19;” and
• under the “Goal and project description” section of the application, demonstrate that the proposed project pertains to related issues, challenges or impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Evaluation and adjudication

PEG COVID-19 Special Initiative applications are subject to the PEG evaluation criteria.

Regulations, policies and related information

Open access

Successful applicants will be encouraged to enable other researchers and stakeholders to access and re-use or text-mine the published articles resulting from their PEG COVID-19 funded research, in accordance with the Call for Open Access to COVID-19 Publications.

Contact information

For more information, contact:

Toll free: 1-855-275-2861
Email: partnershipengagegrants@sshrc-crsh.gc.ca

Date modified:

2021-12-06