The Study Leave (SL) grants are designed to buy individuals out of one semester/term of teaching and provide support for overseas travel and subsistence or for expenditure associated with distance working within the UK. Opportunities for paid study leave include undertaking or participating in:
- A period(s) of business or industrial secondment.
- International staff exchange or periods of overseas research, professional practice or educational activity.
- In staff exchange or periods of research, professional practice or educational activity at other Universities or Government research establishments in the UK.
- Secondments within different parts of BU, for example within different Schools.
Study Leave was the most undersubscribed strand of the Fund in round one with 5 applicants taking the £45,661.50 allocated in July. To give some clarity on what will be funded by the committee please see the FIF Study Leave policy Sept V1
Matthew Bennett writes in his blog piece ‘Jumping Trains’ how Study Leave can help in building networks. Periods of study leave need not be contiguous but can consist of a series of short visits or secondments at one or more institutions. An application for Study Leave may be combined or linked to a bid to the Staff Networking and Mobility Strand where additional travel and subsistence costs are required. Periods of Study Leave are normally between 2 or 6 months, but some flexibility for both shorter and longer periods will be exercised by the committee where there are good reasons for doing so.
The normal cycle of applications is two per year – June and December – however the Committee recognises that opportunities arise at other times and is prepared to take out of cycle applications at any point during an academic year.
I hope you will see the diversity of possibilities available from this strand – by reading the Dr Lai Xu post on securing the maximum £15,000 funding. The project ‘Strengthening Service Computing Research in BU’ is enabling inward mobility into the School of Design, Engineering and Computing.
As part of the intervention programmes in October and November the committee members are all contactable for help, please details on intervention activity here.
Good Luck!!