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TransCoop Programme

In the context of the TransCoop Programme, the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation supports transatlantic research cooperation between German, American and/or Canadian scholars in the humanities, social sciences, economics, and law. Joint research initiatives can receive up to 55,000 EUR over a three-year period. Prerequisite is that the American and/or Canadian partners raise matching funds equalling at least the amount granted by TransCoop.

Funds can be used to finance short-term research visits lasting up to three months, to organise conferences and workshops, for material and equipment and printing costs, as well as for a limited amount of research assistance. Up to 15 p.c. of the TransCoop funds granted can be earmarked for the German partner institution and used as an administrative lump-sum.

Other important details

Further information

List of TransCoop collaborations already sponsored:

  1. The programme provides for research collaboration between German, American and/or Canadian scholars in the humanities, social sciences, economics or law.
  2. The partners must hold at least one doctoral degree and be able to document active involvement in research. There is no age limit. The partners must be affiliated to a research institution in their respective countries for the duration of the project.
  3. The American and/or Canadian partner must prove that he/she can raise matching funds equalling at least the amount applied for in the context of TransCoop funding. The following institutions have provided matching funds in the past.

Applications for the TransCoop Programme should be submitted to the AvH jointly by at least one German and one U.S. and/or Canadian researcher.

The closing date for TransCoop applications in the respective call for proposals is 30 April and 31 October each year.

It is the applicant's responsibility to ensure that he or she has submitted all the necessary documents. The documents required in addition to the application documents, i.e. the confidential expert reviews, can be submitted at the same time as the application to the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation directly. Subsequently, independent peer reviewers assess the applications.

On the basis of these peer reviews, an independent Selection Committee composed of academics from all disciplines makes the final decision on the applications received.

Applicants will be notified about the Selection Committee's decision immediately after the meeting. TransCoop collaborations can only start work 6 months after the closing date for applications at the earliest.

Specifically

Further information

  • Email advisory service: info(at)avh.de
  1. Application
  2. Writing and Submitting an Application
  3. Matching Funds
  4. Allocation of TransCoop Funds

1. Application Procedure

What cooperative projects are most likely to be approved for TransCoop funding?

The goal of the TransCoop Program is to support new transatlantic collaborations. Should you wish to undertake a joint research project for the first time with a colleague whom you only know from conferences or literature in your field, the TransCoop Program might be the right funding instrument for you. Applications for partnerships that were previously funded by the TransCoop Program - especially those with a similar thematic direction - are at a competitive disadvantage. (However, partners who had a project funded in the past are not at any disadvantage if they apply to the program with a new partner and a new topic.) Proposals that seek additional financial support for a project already funded from other sources are unlikely to receive TransCoop funding, as are those projects that focus primarily on training.

To what extent can funds be used to organise conferences and workshops?

The objective of the program is to provide start-up financing for transatlantic cooperative projects, ideally newly established. This collaboration should develop a common research area based on division of labor. In this context, workshops and conferences may be useful tools, but should not appear to be a central, let alone the sole purpose of the cooperation. The TransCoop program may not be used to finance workshops and conferences or travel exclusively. There is a 20% limit on any travel and accommodation expenses that are incurred by attending workshops, as this type of expenditure falls under the category "conferences".

What topics have received TransCoop funding in the past? Is there a list of past TransCoop projects?

Yes. This list can be found under Supported TransCoop Collaborations.

In order to start our collaboration as soon as possible, what deadlines do we need to be aware of, and when can we expect the funds to be allocated?

The deadlines for applications are April 30 and October 31 of each year. Applications will be reviewed at the next Selection Committee meeting, which usually takes place in October or April of the following year respectively. To facilitate your project planning, you will receive either a rejection letter or a notice of acceptance indicating the grant sum within three business days after the Selection Committee meeting. The official grant letter will then be sent to the German partner within two or three weeks. Upon the Foundation's receipt of the signed acceptance documents, the funds are made available according to the valid time and expenses schedule.

What are the chances of being accepted and how many applications are approved each year?

Each year, the Humboldt Foundation receives a fixed amount of money from the Federal Ministry of Education and Research for the TransCoop Program. The total number of projects approved depends on the amount requested by each project approved. Since not all projects exhaust the maximum amount of 55,000 EUR, a different number of projects may receive funding each year. Therefore it is impossible to project how many proposals will be approved in any given year. As a reference point, the approval rate has averaged at approximately 30-35% over the past few years, all fluctuations considered.

In the case of rejection, will we be informed about the reasons? Will we have the opportunity to make improvements or revisions?

Because the Humboldt Foundation assures Selection Committee members and independent peer reviewers of strict confidentiality, the reasons for the Selection Committee's decisions will not be disclosed to applicants in any AvH program. There is no opportunity to revise an application that has already been reviewed by the Selection Committee because of the enormous administrative burden this would impose on both AvH headquarters and the independent peer reviewers. In the past, when only minor revisions were necessary, however, exceptions have been made in individual cases.
 

2. Writing and Submitting an Application

Academic structure of the proposal: Who will read and evaluate the proposal?

First, your application is processed at AvH headquarters according to formal criteria. Then it is forwarded to various external independent peer reviewers, who make an expert assessment of the academic quality of the proposal. AvH draws on an internal network of 3,000 independent peer reviewers in Germany and elsewhere in Europe. We therefore recommend that you construct your joint application so that is clear and comprehensible to researchers in your specific field. Make sure to refer to current literature (bibliography).

Which criteria will be used in deciding on the application?

In its review of applications from a broad range of fields, AvH makes every effort to achieve the highest possible level of comparability.

This is also true for the TransCoop Program, in which proposals from psychology, law, economics, social and political sciences, linguistics, and cultural studies compete with one another.

In addition to the applicant's expertise and the academic relevance and originality of the proposed project, one essential criterion in the evaluation of all applications is the explicitness of the project's construction. In the TransCoop program, in particular, this criterion of explicitness means that you should precisely describe each individual step of your collaboration. You should state exactly how you intend to achieve the successive stages of the collaboration, how they build upon each other, which work methods will be used, and on which principles they will be based.

The collaboration should develop a common research area based on division of labor. In this context, workshops and conferences may be useful tools, but should not appear to be a central, let alone the sole purpose of the cooperation. Funding decisions on collaborations are made by a Selection Committee.

References:
Whom should I ask for references?

Applicants often underestimate the importance of expert reviewers, who are approached by the applicants and asked to provide a commentary on the proposed project. Therefore AvH recommends that you approach reviewers who are likely and able to provide a realistic and differentiated judgment on your work. You are welcome to include more than the required minimum of one letter of reference per applicant in your application, but no more than three per collaborative partner. Letters of reference are required only for the main collaborative partners (main applicants).

Research plan:
How should we structure the research plan?

Each project proposal submitted to the TransCoop Program is unique in structure. In general, the nature of theresearch task, the preparatory work, the method and the form of the cooperation between the partners should be described in a way that allows rigorous academic evaluation.
The following sample questions will help you identify aspects that may be relevant to your proposal:

  1. What is the significance of the project and what are its goals? What is the central issue to be investigated? How does the proposed project fit in with current research in the field?
  2. What specific qualifications do the participating researchers bring to the project? Which preparatory work has already been done?
  3. What form will the cooperation take? How will the collaborative aspects of the project be structured (for example, planned work phases, workshops or conferences and their significance to the topic and to the collaboration)? What do you expect to gain from the collaboration?
  4. Do you plan to integrate and promote junior researchers? How?
  5. What are the principal results that you anticipate in the foreseeable future? Do you plan any further collaboration? Do you expect the collaboration to contribute to creating sustainable structures?

Research plan:
How broad should be the scope of the research issues being addressed?

You should draw up a realistic timetable based on the specific circumstances of the scientific project. The Selection Committee will assess whether the objectives can be reached within the proposed time frame.

Funds for research assistants:
What types of expenditures for research assistants are likely to be approved?

In the TransCoop Program, up to 20% of the requested funds can be allocated to assistants who support you in carrying out tasks such as conducting interviews or literature research. Also, additional support is often needed over the short-term to prepare for conferences or workshops. What is important is to define, describe, and limit precisely the assistants' tasks in the context of the collaborative work. Past experience has shown that general, unspecified items in the budget for personnel are not approved by the Selection Committee and independent peer reviewers.

Materials and equipment:
What types of expenditures for equipment, etc., can be approved?

In the TransCoop Program, funds for materials and equipment are largely restricted to joint tasks. Material costs that are typically approved, aside from consumables, include special equipment or unusual software, which has a clear and direct relationship to the project planned. In general, it is unlikely that computers or laptops will be financed, because, in the estimation of the independent peer reviewers, sufficient equipment of this kind is available at research institutions, even in the humanities. As a basic principle, office equipment and similar items cannot be requested because they fall under the category of institutional support and will not be covered by the TransCoop Program.

Administrative expenditures:
How should the lump sum for administrative expenditures be used?

The purpose of granting this lump sum is to cover the administrative costs the German institution incurs by carrying out the cooperative project. This includes, in particular, the costs of managing the funds, auditing reports of their expenditure, and utilising the existing infrastructure.

Research plan - Budget plan (1):
What must be included in the budget plan?

The budget plan should list the predicted costs of the project based on current estimates. Therefore it is helpful to choose a structure that allows the independent peer reviewers to understand what the individual budget items comprise. While travel costs are usually easy to document based on current quotes, experience has shown that printing costs are more difficult to estimate. In this case, make a realistic estimation; if possible, with an explanation of how it was calculated. Independent peer reviewers and members of the Selection Committee tend to view unspecified lump-sum items negatively. Please refer to the application documents for a sample budget plan.

Research plan - Budget plan (2):
What happens if our budget items are considered too high?

If your application is of convincing academic quality, a high budget will not automatically result in a rejection. The Selection Committee will reduce the budget items in question and recommend approving a grant in the reduced amount, contingent on your consent.

The vast majority of TransCoop projects, however, are approved without any budget cuts. It is thus unnecessary to overstate budgets in anticipation of cuts.

Research plan - Budget plan (3):
We are in the process of calculating the cost of my TransCoop partner's stay at my university. Can AvH provide us with a list of standard per diem rates?

The calculation of per diem rates is based on the legal regulations effective at the German partner institution which administers the TransCoop funds and, upon completion of the project, is responsible for reviewing expenditures and verifying that the funds were used according to the application. These regulations may vary from institution to institution in Germany. AvH has no further requirements in this regard and cannot provide a point of reference.

Research plan - Budget plan (4):
Are we free in our use of the matching funds, or must we split each budget item, allocating half to the TransCoop funds and half to matching funds?

It is up to you which budget items are financed with TransCoop funds and which with matching funds.

Time and expense schedule (form):
How should we structure the time and expenses schedule?

Given the uniqueness of each cooperative project, AvH does not require you to fill in complex forms, but merely requests the completion of the form 'time and expenses schedule' in order to ensure internal administration of the funds requested. A list and explanation of individual expenditures must be provided in the budget plan as part of the application.
 

3. Matching Funds

Where can we apply for funding that would be considered matching funds?

Often the Canadian or American partner's university provides funding, as do private foundations and national institutions such as the National Endowment for the Humanities in the United States (NEH) or the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC). A list of organizations that have contributed matching funds to TransCoop projects in the past can be found under institutions.

My American partner's university is granting him/her leave of absence from teaching obligations in the coming semester and is offering this as an alternative to matching funds. Is this acceptable?

No. The TransCoop Program expects that the salaries of researchers participating in the program will continue to be paid by their home institutions.

We will use rooms at the university in the context of our TransCoop project. In lieu of matching funds, the university has agreed to let us use these facilities free of charge. Is this acceptable?

No. The matching funds must be directly available to the research project in cash. In-kind contributions, which can be considered indirect financing of the project by the respective institution, cannot be recognized as part of the matching funds.

Does the 20% cap on costs related to conferences and assistants apply to the matching funds as well?

No, this restriction only applies to TransCoop funds. You may integrate the matching funds into your budget plan according to your priorities.

We will not be able to provide proof of all our matching funding by the time AvH reviews our application. Can we still apply?

The program administrators at AvH and the independent peer reviewers are aware that applications for support from institutions in the United States and Canada have to comply with deadlines that may not correspond with those of the TransCoop Program, and that applications which seem to have a strong likelihood of success are sometimes unexpectedly turned down. The Selection Committee takes this into account, but it is not a reason for rejection. AvH expects that you will make every effort to secure alternative financing promptly.

Currency rates fluctuate. How should we calculate the amount of matching funds?

The exchange rate in effect on the date of the official notice of the grant will be used.
 

4. Allocation of TransCoop Funds

Can use of the TransCoop funds be transacted via my personal bank account?

No, because you must provide proof of the use of the funds via the administration at your research institution. Therefore, in preparing your application, you must make arrangements with your university administration concerning the call for funds and the final audit of TransCoop expenditures. The Humboldt Foundation requires a written agreement on this matter before it can release funds.

Can I make TransCoop funds available to my North American partner?

The TransCoop funds are granted solely to the German collaborative partner, who, via his/her university administration, is responsible for using the funds according to the approved application and budget. If, in the course of the project, it is necessary to use funds in the United States or Canada, AvH has no objection, just as it does not object to matching funds being used in Germany.

What happens if we are unable to complete our project in the time foreseen?

It is understandable that a TransCoop project can take a few months longer than planned when unforeseen circumstances arise. If the delay will carry over into the next fiscal year, please alert AvH. While AvH cannot guarantee that the funding can be made available in the following year, it will consider a carry-over on a case-by-case basis.

Further information

  • Email advisory service: info(at)avh.de