This page is intended to provide quick access to statistical data and advice on the management of the research application process, to aid institutions in improving their success rates and reducing the burden on the peer review community.
Research Councils receive more high quality applications than they are able to support and institutions submit more applications than are likely to be funded. In order to manage this process it is important to have specific institutional data on success rates for each council, placed in the context of wider funding patterns. This data has not previously been available in a single easily accessible location. Therefore to assist in data retrieval, the Councils have created central web-hubs linked to this page with all the key data on success rates in addition to other useful data on funded grants and overall budgets.
These Hubs can be accessed below:
Demand Management
The Research Council success rates reflect the level of demand balanced against the available resources during the year. Access to the success rate statistics allow individual Institutions to identify potential issues which they can work through with the councils.
In addition to the costs for all those involved in preparing and submitting proposals, another significant driver for demand management is the increasing burden being placed on peer reviewers, the risk being that the quality of decision making could be affected if that burden continues to grow. By its very nature peer review is designed to identify successful and unsuccessful grant proposals. However there are some proposals submitted which have little or no chance of success. It is the pre-sifting of these proposals by applicants and institutions, leading to a reduction in peer review burden to the community and improvement in overall success rates that the Councils encourage.
Research Councils need institutions to actively encourage self-management of demand and quality control. To help with this, Research Councils will continue to seek an active dialogue with their research communities concerning levels of demand and funding rates and in disseminating best practice. To that end the following have been made centrally available here to assist in this process:
Examples of Institutional demand management processes
There are many examples of Institutional Management processes. The Councils do not currently have data to support any system in particular and would encourage institutions to consider which system for reducing demand would be the most appropriate in their particular situation. The following example involves a more extensive process than many departments use but is one of the few known examples proven to work statistically:
Applicants must submit an outline to a research committee consisting of senior members of the department who in most cases have experience on a peer review panel. If the outline is approved applicants must then submit a full application to the committee taking their comments into account. Full applications are often reiterated with the committee and only when the committee are happy with the quality of the application do they approve submission. This process is in time with the main funding bodies’ deadlines to give applicants adequate time to write the application and the department time to administer the costings. This institution has the highest success rate with the Council they submit to most often.
If other institutions have different approaches which they wish to share, please contact RCUK for details to be included here.
Advice for Applicants
Further advice on writing/submitting proposals is available via the documents listed below.
Grant writing guides and presentations
Guides to peer review processes