Thank you for considering hosting a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow in your Department/Faculty/Institution.

If you wish your applicants to be eligible for institutional matched funding from the Isaac Newton Trust, you will need to set things up to enter your best candidates into the Cambridge Internal competition: Cambridge internal competition for matched funding 2024

Note that you set your own deadline for the first stage and will need to make this known to candidates.

Timetable

Note that the Isaac Newton Trust has brought forward the internal competition deadlines. We are aware that some applicants apply to more than one university - last year, we lost some excellent candidates who were obliged to make decisions before New Year on whether to accept offers of matched funding from other universities. Making our offers earlier will give candidates a free choice between an offer from Cambridge and from other UK institutions.

Matching funding – what the Leverhulme Trust and INT offer

INT’s basic offer is to match the Leverhulme’s  offer of 50% salary + on-costs up to a maximum of £26k in any one year. This essentially means that INT support is limited to supporting candidates who start at or below pt 44 on the single spine. Any candidate seeking a starting salary at above 44, will need another (non-INT) source of funds to support the additional cost.

However, INT is aware that the current £52k funding cap will not be adequate to cover salary costs in every year of an award, even for Fellows appointed at the postdoc starting grade (pt 41).

The INT is committed to assisting host institutions that cannot find the cost of the deficit for candidates appointed at pt 41-44. No suitably qualified candidate should be turned down because of a potential salary deficit, but please note that the INT’s offer of underwriting the deficit in matched funding cannot be used to support a starting salary higher than pt 44 on the single spine. INT believes that this policy is in line with the Leverhulme Trust’s capping of salary costs at the lower end of the postdoc scale.

We will ask you for projected salary costs at the outset and discuss with you how INT might help to meet any shortfall.

Submitting Applications for the INT Internal Competition

The deadline for receipt by the Isaac Newton Trust is 17 November 2023.  Late applications will not be considered.

Putting forward INT-supported candidates to the National Competition

You will be informed of the outcome of the INT competition within four weeks, and selected candidates will be issued with offer letters to be included in the national application.  You will need to work with your selected applicants to finalise their application according to the Leverhulme Trust’s requirements and should start this process as soon as you hear from the INT. The national deadline for the Leverhulme Trust competition is 22 February 2024.  

Use of Department funds for Matching Funding

INT is aware that some departments have sufficient funding to support candidates without INT funds. If you put a candidate into the national competition without putting them through the INT internal competition, the INT will expect you to stand by your offer in the event that your candidate is successful in the national competition. However, you may contact INT after the final awards are announced to see whether INT might have any budget remaining to help share the cost of the award. Each case will be viewed on its merits and the number of awards INT is supporting through its own competition.

All successful candidates who take up their LECF at Cambridge will become welcomed as members of the INT’s Fellows' Association.

Host Application Checklist

Our checklist for the internal funding competition reflects as closely as possible the requirements of the Leverhulme Trust’s national competition, so that most materials can be reused for online submission to the Leverhulme Trust.

Note in particular that the Leverhulme Trust decides who can be a referee (see Early Career Fellowships Application Help Notes 2024 – our requirements are the same, except that we don’t require a third referee at this stage.) INT cannot comment on the suitability of any given referee – you will need to address these questions to the Leverhulme Trust.

Internal Competition Deadline 17 November 2023

Please send a single pdf for each selected candidate, with the required documents in the order listed below, to the Trust Administrator:

1. host checklist to include estimates of the salary + on costs for the three years of the award.   INT will ask whether you can cover some or all of the shortfall in from non-public sources; you may request that INT provides underwriting.
2. the application materials submitted by the candidate (applicant's internal competition coversheet, cv, list of publications, two statements of research (a statement of current research, and the research the candidate intends to undertake as an LECF)
3. two references sent directly to you from referees nominated by the applicant.
4. your score sheet (questionnaire) for the selected candidate(s) (needed for the internal competition only)
5. a covering letter to the INT from the Head of the Host Institution indicating:

• the names of your top candidates (no more than two) in rank order
• the total number of applications received
• information on how the ranking has been produced (e.g. by your own ranking committee)

The INT will check the eligibility of applicants under the Leverhulme rules and pass eligible applications to the relevant academic committee for nomination of candidates for an INT award. These committees comprise senior academics representing the Schools.