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General questions
 

► Who can apply for a start-up grant?
► What is meant by "start-up grant" ?
► When should I apply?
► How high is the grant?
► How high is the child benefit and what do I have to do in order to receive it?
► When does the start-up grant begin and for how many months will I receive it?
► I was employed at Heidelberg University (not including the University Hospital) in the 3 months before the beginning of the bridging grant. How does this effect the receipt of a grant?
► Can I receive funding through an employment contract or another grant while I am receiving the start-up grant?
► What deadlines do I have to meet if my application is approved?
► How do I know if the Graduate Academy has received my application?
► When will I be notified of the decision regarding my application?
► Can I interrupt the grant?

Questions about the application forms

► What do I need to consider when filling out the application form?
► Do I need to submit any additional documents (e.g. publication lists, CV etc.)?
► What is meant by "external funding"?
► Who can issue the evaluation form for my application?

 

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General questions

 

Who can apply for a start-up grant?

The start-up grants are only open to doctoral candidates who have been officially ad­mit­ted to the Faculty of Modern Languages at Heidelberg University. As a general rule, confirmation of admission to the faculty must be submitted with the application. In exceptional cases, however, the official admission letter can also be submitted at the start of funding.

 

What is meant by "start-up grant"?

The purpose of the start-up grant is to financially support the initial phase of your doctoral studies during which you may be i) clarifying issues that could prevent you from successfully beginning your studies or ii) carrying out preliminary work on your doctoral project. This could include issues such as finding a source of long-term funding, dealing with the formalities of moving to Heidelberg from abroad, organizing child care or dealing with the compatibility of doctoral studies and a career or investigating questions regarding the contents of your project. This grant can be awarded for a maximum of six months.

Note: The funding is awarded in the form of grants. The award of a grant does not establish an employment relationship between Heidelberg University and the recipient. The recipient of the grant may not be obligated to perform any specific academic service or employment activity in connection with the grant.

 

When should I apply?

Applications can be submitted at any time.

The applications will be collected as a group after the deadlines indicated below. The funding should start within the period indicated for the respective deadline.       

Deadlines	Start of funding
January 10	March 1 until May 1 of the same year
April 10	June 1 until August 1 of the same year
July 10	September 1 until November 1 of the same year
October 10	December 1 of the same year until February 1 of the following year

 

Please take note of the deadlines and corresponding funding periods. The awards notifications will be sent out about 8 weeks after each deadline.
 

Important:

• Grants cannot be approved retroactively.
• Incomplete applications will not be considered.
   

How high is the grant?

The grant is max. 1,000 Euro per month and will be awarded for a maximum of 6 months. The grant is paid out monthly. If you have a child, you can apply for the child benefit.

 

How high is the child benefit and what do I have to do in order to receive it?

The monthly child benefit is 400 Euro for one child and 100 Euro for each additional child. In order to receive the child benefit, you must submit the application form that is sent out with the approvals notice after the grants have been awarded. Therefore, please indicate in the online registration form whether you have children and if so, how many.

Please note the following conditions for receiving the child benefit. You can apply if

• you or your spouse has been granted child allowance payments (Kindergeld) for a common child under the Income Tax Act or the Federal Child Allowance Act,
• you, as a single parent, receive child allowance payments (Kindergeld) for a child under the Income Tax Act or the Federal Child Allowance Act,
• you, due to your non-German citizenship, have no legal claim to child allowance payments under the Income Tax Act or the Federal Child Allowance Act but can prove with a certificate from the local residents‘ office (Einwohnermeldeamt) that your child lives in your household.

 

When does the start-up grant begin and for how many months will I receive it?

The grant will be paid out for a maximum of 6 months. You can determine the starting point and duration of your grant according to your needs, taking into account the deadlines and the corresponding time periods. The grant can begin only at the beginning of a month and ends at the end of a month. Please indicate the time period during which you would like to receive the grant on the online registration form.

Please note: The duration of the grant should correspond to the period and the tasks that you need to complete in order to deal with the issues that are delaying the start of your doctoral studies and/or to carry out initial work in your doctoral project. Please explain how you plan to structure the period supported by the start-up grant with reference to your specific situation in the application form (see » Application procedure and forms).

 

I was employed at Heidelberg University (not including the University Hospital) in the 3 months before the beginning of the start-up grant. How does this effect the receipt of a grant?

It is not possible to receive the grant if the following conditions apply to you:

• you were employed as a Mitarbeiter/in nach TV-L or a wissenschaftliche Hilfskraft at Heidelberg University (not including the University Hospital) in the three months before the start of the funding AND
• your employment consisted of a contact of more than 25% of a full-time position AND
• the work you did has a direct connection to your doctoral project (this means that through this contract you earned income for doing the research that makes up your doctoral project).

If this describes your funding situation, please contact the Graduate Academy (ga-docs@uni-heidelberg.de).

 

Can I receive funding through an employment contract or another grant while I am receiving the start-up grant?

The purpose of the start-up grant is to help you to start your dissertation success­fully and efficiently and to clarify external issues that might delay this start or to carry out initialwork on your project . Therefore, while you are receiving the grant, you should concentrate your efforts only on dealing with these issues or this work. Furthermore, this grant is intended to support doctoral candidates who have no other source of funding during this initial phase. Therefore, if you plan to have additional income from employment or another grant while you receive this start-up grant, you must indicate the reasons for this income clearly in your application.

Important: If there are changes to your income while receiving the grant, please contact the Graduate Academy immediately (ga-docs@uni-heidelberg.de).

 

What deadlines do I have to meet if my application is approved?

You must send a notification of the successful completion of the project as outlined in your application to the Graduate Academy no later than 3 months after your funding ends.

If your project is not completed within 3 months of the end of your funding, you must at this time submit an interim report on the status of your project (incl. a detailed explanation of the delay) and a schedule for its completion as well as a short evaluation by your supervisor to the Graduate Academy.

The Graduate Academy reserves the right to completely or partially revoke your grant if these documents are not received by the Graduate Academy within the three month deadline as outlined above.

 

How do I know if the Graduate Academy has received my application?

Unfortunately, it is not possible for us to automatically notify each applicant that their application has been received. If you want to check on the status of your application, please send an email to: ga-docs@uni-heidelberg.de.

Please note that incomplete applications will not be considered.

 

When will I be notified of the decision regarding my application?

The awards notifications are sent out after the entire evaluation process is completed; this process takes about 8 weeks after each application deadline. It is not possible to inform you about the results of your application before all evaluations are completed.

 

Can I interrupt the grant?

Yes. It is possible in exceptional cases (for example illness, pregnancy, family reasons) to interrupt the grant for up to 12 months, as long as your doctoral supervisor confirms that the successful begin of your doctoral studies is not jeopardized by the interruption. Please contact the Graduate Academy immediately if you think that you will need to interrupt your grant (ga-docs@uni-heidelberg.de).  

 

 

 

Questions about the application forms

 

What do I need to consider when filling out the application form?

Please fill out the application form (see » Application procedure and forms) electronically; do not handwrite your application. In order to ensure that the electronic forms work with all versions of the Adobe software, we strongly recommend that you first download and save the empty application form on your computer and then fill the form out and save it again.

Please use an Apple or Windows operating system to fill out the forms. The forms are not compatible with a Linux system.

Please use only the space provided in the existing fields on the application forms. The evaluators will not be able to read any text that extends beyond the existing limits of the fields.

Please do not change the formatting of the fields on the application forms.

Please send the application documents as separate attachments in your email. You do not need to merge the various documents into one PDF file.

 

Do I need to submit any additional documents (e.g. publication lists, CV etc.)?

The application procedure and required application documents are indicated in detail here. No additional documents that are not listed on the website such as publication lists, literature lists, or CVs will be sent to the evaluators.

 

What is meant by "external funding"?

“External funding” refers to funds that you have received from an external funding organization for your doctoral project in general or for another research project.

 

Who can issue the evaluation form for my application?

The evaluation form for your application must be issued and submitted to the Graduate Academy by your doctoral supervisor. Please note that the evaluation is to be treated confidentially by your supervisor and must be sent by your supervisor directly to the Graduate Academy: ga-docs@uni-heidelberg.de

Please be aware that the application deadlines also pertain to the receipt of the evaluation form.

If it is not possible for your first supervisor to fill out the evaluation form for you (e.g. due to illness, parental leave etc.), you can ask another professor in your subject area who is familiar with your project to evaluate your application and complete the form for you.