Guidelines for Writing Proposals for ELLIS Units
Proposals for New Units
The proposals should describe how they address the criteria 1.-7. outlined in the call for proposals of ELLIS Units. The proposals are to be submitted via EasyChair by the deadline specified in the call.
In detail, the proposal is composed of two parts:
a) The proposal. Addresses the required criteria for the creation of the ELLIS Unit. The proposal shall not exceed 8 pages (not including references) on a single-column page format with 11-point font.
The content of the proposal is as follows:
- Overview and alignment with ELLIS [max 1 page]
- Organizational structure [max 1 page]
- Excellence of the Team [max 3 pages]
- Societal and economic impact [max 1 page]
- Connection to ELLIS [max 0.5 page]
- Budget [max 1 page - fill in and attach the proposed budget template table]
- Contribution towards running ELLIS Society [max 0.5 page]
b) Support letter(s). Each participating organization in the proposed ELLIS Unit provides a support letter signed by the legal representative (e.g. director/dean/rector) of the participating organization that includes a commitment to the ELLIS Unit criteria described in the call for at least 5 years. The Unit is expected to use the template provided here.
Guidelines for writing the proposals
- Alignment with ELLIS [max 1 page]: Provide a free-form description of the envisioned Unit, including (i) its mission, (ii) vision, (iii) research areas and (iv) added unique value. The text should provide answers to the questions below.
- Organisational structure [max 1 page]: Describe the hosting organization(s) and why they were chosen; Describe the organizational structure of the Unit and how decisions will be taken. Name the director of the Unit to ensure the sustainability and success of the Unit. In case there are several institutions involved, it is possible to nominate one co-director for each participating institution. Please describe the overall critical mass of the Unit (how many PIs, sizes of their team, number of PhD students/post-docs, number of expected ELLIS PhD students/post-docs). Describe the Unit’s infrastructure, administrative, and technical services. Name the coordinator and PR person.
- The excellence of the team [max 3 pages]: Please describe the proposed researchers (PIs). For each proposed researcher in the team, provide a short bio (no longer than 1/5 page), including the year of their PhD, their h-index, the link to their Google Scholar page, and whether they are ELLIS Fellows, Scholars, or Members. List the top-tier venues where they regularly publish and the number of publications in those venues in the last 5 or 10 years, prestigious awards, honors and grants, invitations to serve as AC/PC for top-tier conferences, and membership in editorial boards of top-tier journals. Please also include significant innovation activities (patents, start-ups, tech. transfers, consulting for industry) and other significant societal impact activities (e.g., institutional/government initiatives, boards, strategies).
Suggested structure for the short PI bio and examples. Adam Smith. Male. ELLIS Member, proposed ELLIS Fellow and PI in the Unit. Professor at hosting institution X. PhD 2005. h-index 54, 25,423 citations. Google Scholar link. Areas: Computer vision, machine learning, robotics. Top-tier publications in last 5 years: 5xCVPR, 3xICCV, 2xECCV, 2x PAMI, 1xIJCV, 2x NeurIPS, 1x ICLR, 1x TRO. Awards: 1x Best paper finalist at CVPR 2023; ERC StG 2012; 2nd Place EgoCentric benchmark competition 2021. PC/AC invitations: AC CVPR (3x), AC ICCV (1x), Senior AC NeurIPS (1x). Editorial boards: Associate editor TPAMI (2018-2023). Other invitations: keynote speaker at X. Innovation: 2 US patents, 1 US patent application. Co-founder of start-up Y. Contributed to regional AI strategy. Rebecca Dubois. Female. ELLIS Member, proposed ELLIS Scholar and PI in the Unit, Associate Professor at hosting institution X. PhD 2018. h-index 18, 6,423 citations. Google Scholar link. Areas: Natural language processing, machine learning. Top-tier publications in last 5 years: 5xEMNLP, 3xACL. Awards: 1x Best paper finalist at EMNLP 2023; … Franka Rossi. Female. ELLIS Member. Proposed PI in the Unit. Assistant Professor at hosting institution X. PhD 2022. h-index 11, 3,423 citations. Google Scholar link. Areas: Robotics and robot learning. Top-tier publications in the last 5 years: 1xTRO, 1x IJRR, 1xNeurIPS, 2xCoRL. Awards: … |
- Societal and economic impact [max 1 page]: Please outline the plan for having a societal and economic impact. Please describe links to or collaborations with local industry. It is expected that each Unit has some links or expressions of interest from local companies. Please describe the current/planned activities of the Unit towards local / EU policy making. Examples include organization/participation in local / EU outreach events; providing support/input to local / EU policy-making; and memberships in local/EU advisory committees/boards. Please describe your activities/support for the creation of start-ups/spin-offs. Please describe how the Unit provides flexibility to its researchers to get involved with startup companies.
- Connection to ELLIS [max .5 page]: Please describe the existing links of the proposed Unit with the rest of the ELLIS network. Examples include: joint publications with other ELLIS Fellows/Scholars and Members, collaborations with other Units, participation in ELLIS research programs, in the ELLIS PhD program, participation in projects building on ELLIS like ELIAS, ELSA, etc., participation in ELLIS committees or providing reviews for ELLIS.
- Budget [max 1 page]: Please provide the planned yearly budget of the Unit using the provided template. If the Unit consists of multiple organizations, please indicate the planned split between the organizations. Please note that it is expected that (i) the salaries of permanent researchers (ELLIS Fellows / Scholars / Members) constitute at least 500k euro/year; (ii) the budget for the rest of the team and other mechanisms (travel, etc.) is at least 1 million euro/year. See the the budget template.
- Contribution towards running ELLIS Society [max .5 page]: Please describe how the Unit is planning to contribute towards running ELLIS Society. Please note that it is expected that each Unit contributes 20k EUR / year Unit membership fee. See details in the Unit contributions document. Please refer to the corresponding planned budget items in the budget table (see 6. above).
Proposals from existing Units to expand or merge
Proposals from existing Units to expand or merge should include parts 1. Alignment with ELLIS and 2. Organization structure describing the newly expanded/merged Unit. Parts 3.-7. are optional, but proposals should include support letter(s) signed by all participating institutions.
Such proposals can be submitted any time by sending an email with the required information to sites@ellis.eu and will undergo a fast-track evaluation by the Units committee. The Units committee will aim for a response within 1-2 months from the submission time, but please note that the committee may not meet in the summer. The proposing teams are encouraged to consult the Units committee in advance of preparing such a proposal. This process is typically triggered when the Unit is changing its name, for example, from covering one city to covering the whole country. If the Unit is just adding an additional institution in the same city and keeping its original name, this process is not necessary, and only providing an additional support letter for the newly added institution is sufficient.
For questions, please email sites@ellis.eu.
