The British Academy Talent Development Awards for Researchers 2024-2025 (up to £10,000)

The British Academy has been funded by the UK government, Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) to continue its support for the Talent Development Awards scheme.

The aim of the scheme is to promote the building of skills and capacities for current and future generations, including in core areas like quantitative skills, interdisciplinarity, data science, digital humanities and languages. This scheme promotes the acquisition and advancement of skills in relevant areas by UK-based researchers, supporting innovative research methods, be that through skills development, collaboration or dissemination. The overarching aims of the scheme are to invest in UK talent and skills, and as a result, to contribute to the development and delivery of high quality regional, national and international research by:

raising the quality of advanced quantitative skills and/or data science skills used in research, including digital methods;
creating new opportunities for knowledge and skills to exchange across disciplines and sectors; and
promoting language learning and the transferable skills that language learning provides.

The scheme is intended for established researchers in the Humanities and Social Sciences with a current long-term appointment at a UK-based Higher Education Institution (HEI) or Independent Research Organisation (IRO) who wish to experiment with new methods that speak to the aims of the scheme, as above. Equally, it is intended for researchers who wish to explore new opportunities for skills development and knowledge translation. The awards will, in particular, be valuable to researchers wishing to pilot new methods and approaches in order to apply for larger grants in the longer term or develop new partnerships, be it locally, nationally or internationally. Applicants are encouraged to be creative in their thinking about how these awards can best help advance their research ideas, including through collaborative, partnership working. This scheme is designed to benefit the career, skills and talent of award-holders, and by extension, groups within or beyond academia who will also benefit from the sharing of skills and methods.

Aim and Benefits

The awards are up to £10,000 in value, and tenable for a minimum period of 6 months and up to a maximum period of 12 months.

Requirements

Eligible Lead Applicants must be ordinarily resident in the United Kingdom with a current long-term appointment that will continue for at least as long as the period of the award at a UK-based institution (HEI or IRO). Applicants for the Talent Development Awards should be intending to pursue original, independent research in any field of study within the Humanities or Social Sciences. There are no quotas for individual subject areas and no thematic priorities.

Lead Applicants who do not have a doctorate may have equivalent experience, which they should define in the personal statement section. Co-applicants may be based in the UK or overseas. They may have a doctorate or equivalent experience, or other specialist knowledge as appropriate to the aims of the scheme.

Interview date, Process and Venue

The awards are for a minimum period of 6 months and up to a maximum period of 12 months, starting from no earlier than 1 March 2025 and no later than 31 March 2025.