In this text, this time, different channels are introduced that the researcher should follow in order to stay on track, e.g. new funding searches, trainings, tools, etc. In addition to newsletters, several of these can also be followed on social media channels.

 

Messi

Let’s start with our own intra. We at research services include information events, information about open funding applications and various guidelines, which may have been updated, in the news or events. If you want to keep up with these, but you can’t always open the intra, then subscribe to the newsletter according to these instructions:

• Sign in to Messi and select My account> Edit notification settings.
• Select the day(s) of the week when you want a summary of the front-page news and events to your email.

• If you want to include in the same email all the latest news, upcoming events and new documents from a specific actor, select Actors and add the ones you want by clicking Enable notifications.
• If you want to include in the same email all the latest news and upcoming events on a certain topic or follow funding opportunities or all content targeted at a certain group, select Topics and add the ones you want by clicking Enable notifications.

In Messi, under services, you can also find a researcher’s toolkit, these pages have e.g. budget base and instructions for preparing the project application, tips for communication or instructions on how to store research data and what needs to be considered. All new researchers should wade through the toolkit, you won’t remember it all at once, but you’ll at least learn to know where to find the information later.

In Intra, we also always announce our events, such as the date, theme and registration form of the new Research Café. After the event, you can find the recording and materials here in the documents.

 

Newsletters

There are many different types of newsletters and I will not attempt to collect a comprehensive list of all of them here. However, I will raise a few points here:

• The WFEO, i.e. Western Finland Europe office, offers up-to-date information about the heart of Brussels. In their newsletter, searches, events and hearings relevant to Western Finland are highlighted. Unfortunately this newsletter is only in Finnish, but we translate the relevant news in English and you can find those in Messi. Through WFEO, we are also members of the ERRIN network, and if you want to register in the ERRIN network, you should contact WFEO.
• By subscribing to the Academy of Finland’s newsletter, you stay up-to-date on new applications and information, as well as future application dates.
• If business cooperation or Horizon Europe is close to your heart, you should follow up on Business Finland. They have interesting events throughout the year and materials from previous events are also well available, so you can read them yourself.
• It is worth ordering the newsletters of a few foundations by e-mail, if they are essential in terms of your research funding and your own field. The largest and most extensive foundations are the Finnish Cultural Foundation, the Kone Foundation and the Finnish Work Enviroment Fund.

 

Calls for Funding

There are several pages for tracking funding applications, some of which conveniently combine several funding applications. On the Research.fi website, you can see the searches of various Finnish foundations. Later, it is hoped that a researcher’s profile will also be added here, and thus also serve as a search portal for researchers. However, the site is gradually developing and new features will be introduced, so you should follow this page for this reason as well.

Open EU funding can all be found on the Funding & Tenders portal. There is a lot of funding available, so you should use the filters diligently here. In addition, we at the University of Vaasa maintain and update our own customized listing in an excel table of interesting open searches, ask Mathias Björklund for more information about this.

Research professional is an international database maintained by ResearchResearch Ltd, which comprehensively includes both Finnish and international research funders. You can search the database for e.g. by industry, country or keyword. From the database, you can also order yourself the latest searches as an e-mail notification. Research Professional is freely available to you on the University of Vaasa’s network (Campus Access) or with your personal ID, which enables remote access to the database. You can get a personal ID by registering for the service Research Professional on the front page of the database (log in). Registration must be done online at the university. Here, we have already customized our own search parameters for each academic unit.

If you are interested in smaller research funding, it is worth monitoring the Interregs. Each Interreg have their own website (and social media) that you should check out. You can check the Interreg Aurora here and order newsletter for Interreg Europa here. The order form for Baltic Sea’s newsletter can be found here.

In research services, unfortunately, we do not necessarily have all financiers in our back pocket, but we also rely on the fact that the researchers themselves know their field best and follow the funding applications in their field. Today, we strive for more targeted marketing in these matters and of course we advise you on suitable funding searches when we know what exactly you are researching and the information comes to us.