Tagged / Je-S

Je-S unavailable for 4 days in March

BU research, Guidance

If you are preparing an application to UKRI or any of the research councils, or you have an awarded project that requires either maintenance or end of award actions, please take note of the following:

From 17:00 GMT on Thursday 21 March to 08:30 GMT Tuesday 26 March 2019 the Je-S system will be unavailable.

Working closely with UKRI, UK SBS will be renewing and moving the IT infrastructure that supports the grant administration services for UKRI and their Councils, known as Je-S. To complete this work the Je-S system will be unavailable for a 4 day period, including the weekend between 17:00 Thursday 21 March – 08:30 Tuesday 26 March.

This is mainly an infrastructure change and there will be no effect on the functionality or look and feel of the Je-S system itself.

Please also note that Je-S email addresses are being changed from RCUK to UKRI. The following from email addresses will be changing for Je-S automated emails:

Current email                  New email

JeSHelp@rcuk.ac.uk       JeSHelp@je-s.ukri.org

Je-S1Help@rcuk.ac.uk   Je-S1Help@je-s.ukri.org

Je-SHelp@rcuk.ac.uk     Je-SHelp@je-s.ukri.org

Je-S outage – are you working on a research council application?

BU research, Guidance

The UKRI Joint Electronic Submissions (Je-S) service will be unavailable between 9pm GMT on Friday 23 November to 8am GMT on Monday 26 November due to essential database maintenance.

If you are working on an application to the research councils, you will need to be aware of this and may want to download any essential documents (for your application or help text/guidance) before 9pm on Friday.

UKRI apologise for any inconvenience.

Research Councils new grants service Regional Workshop

BU research, Funding opportunities

RCUKRCUK are undertaking a project to upgrade their electronic grants submission service.  Do you want to go and hear more about the grants service in person? They are running regional workshops around the UK and will be holding a workshop in London on 26th September 2016.  Alice Brown from the RKEO will be attending but it would also be useful for academics to attend.

The aim of this event is to come and talk to the research community about the Research Councils programme to replace their existing grants service and to, where possible, simplify and standardise grants policy and process. This event will be an opportunity to hear about what progress they have made and to ask them questions. In the afternoon they would also like to carry out user testing with a smaller group. They would like to invite a mixed audience to attend including academics, university research administrators and managers, system and data staff etc.

When – Monday, 26 September 2016 from 09:00 to 17:00 (BST)

Where – Imperial College London – Exhibition Road, London, SW7 2AZ

To register, click here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/research-councils-new-grants-service-regional-workshop-tickets-27166553894

Would you like to test the new research council grants system?

BU research, Research news

Je-S logoThe research councils are replacing their electronic grants submission service, Je-S, in 2017. More information about this project can be found here http://www.rcuk.ac.uk/funding/2017update/

They are looking for more people to get involved in user research. Can you help?

Initially they are looking for researchers; they need to test with both people who have never applied for a research grant through the Je-S system before as well as those who are more frequent applicants. At this stage they will predominantly be testing prototypes with users. User testing will be carried out throughout the year in a number of formats, such as site visits, remotely over Skype, or through labs where users go to a central location nearby.

Test sessions will take between half an hour to an hour. If you are interested in being a tester then please can you let me, Jo Garrad, know by 15th July 2016. You will need to provide me with the following information:

  1. Name
  2. Organisation
  3. Academic Discipline (high level)
  4. Email address and telephone number
  5. Have you got experience of applying for grants? yes/no
  6. Are you likely to apply for grants in the future but haven’t done so to date? yes/no
  7. Do you work in a research development, finance or other research office role? yes/no
  8. Have you conducted peer reviews for the Research Councils or any other funder before? yes/no
  9. Have you sat on an assessment or moderating panel for the Research Councils or any funder before? yes/no

Would you like to test the new research council grants system?

BU research, Research news

Je-S logoThe research councils are replacing their electronic grants submission service, Je-S, in 2017.  More information about this project can be found here http://www.rcuk.ac.uk/funding/2017update/

They are looking for more people to get involved in user research. Can you help?

Initially they are looking for researchers; they need to test with both people who have never applied for a research grant through the Je-S system before as well as those who are more frequent applicants.  At this stage they will predominantly be testing prototypes with users.  User testing will be carried out throughout the year in a number of formats, such as site visits, remotely over Skype, or through labs where users go to a central location nearby.

Test sessions will take between half an hour to an hour.  If you are interested in being a tester then please can you let me, Jo Garrad, know by 15th July 2016.  You will need to provide me with the following information:

  1. Name
  2. Organisation
  3. Academic Discipline (high level)
  4. Email address and telephone number
  5. Have you got experience of applying for grants? yes/no
  6. Are you likely to apply for grants in the future but haven’t done so to date? yes/no
  7. Do you work in a research development, finance or other research office role? yes/no
  8. Have you conducted peer reviews for the Research Councils or any other funder before? yes/no
  9. Have you sat on an assessment or moderating panel for the Research Councils or any funder before? yes/no

Future of the Je-S system

BU research, Research news

Je-S logoThe Research Councils have informed us that they will be upgrading their electronic grants submission service in 2017.  The Je-S system has come to a natural end and they plan to design a smarter, simpler more user friendly service in line with the latest digital standards. Work is already underway to design the new awards service. This work is based on extensive user research and BU will nominate a primary coordinator (from RKEO) to engage with RCUK about this project.

What sort of improvements can you expect?

As an applicant, peer reviewer or research office administrator, you will no longer use the Je-S system to apply for grants, submit reviews or manage your research organisations grants activities. There will be an entirely new external portal. In future the whole grant application form will be digitised, which means in the majority of cases no more uploading of attachments; and there are other improvements such as in-built formatting for font size and word count, improved dashboards to help you manage your grant activities as well as guidance relevant to a particular funding opportunity close at hand, all on the one screen, while you are applying. This is just some of the functionality being developed and iterated through user testing and feedback.

When will the new system go live?

The ambition is to start to run a small number of funding opportunities through the new system by March 2017 to test that everything is working as it should be. After March 2017, there will be parallel running of the new awards service and Je-S, which will be gradually phased out throughout 2017. We expect the full transition from Je-S to the new awards service to be completed by May 2018.

How you can keep up to date with what’s happening?

This is an important programme of work and RCUK are keen to keep you informed of progress. You can receive regular updates about this project by subscribing to their mailing list at http://rcuk.us13.list-manage1.com/subscribe?u=ad56e1b1044a6f3fab9f61fb8&id=bf29a1fd1a

For updates about news and changes to Research Councils grants service more generally,  you can sign up to their quarterly grants newsletter at https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/webadmin?SUBED1=RCUKSSC-GRANTS&A=1

If you are applying to the research councils soon, please note Je-S unavailability

Funding opportunities, Guidance, Research news

Please note that the Je-S system (the research councils e-submission site) will be unavailable from 16:00 GMT on Thursday 16th April 2015 until 08.30 GMT on Wednesday 22nd April 2015.  Further details are available on the Je-S Login page.

This is a significant amount of down time and so please bear this in mind if you are writing an application for funding to the research councils.

Important change to your JeS account

BU research, Guidance

This is to anyone within the Faculties who is registered on Je-S (the research council application submission system).

In light of the changes to the Faculty names, Je-S have updated all account holders details (approximately 400 people) to reflect the new structure.   Je-S were asked to do a basic mapping of Schools to new Faculties:

  • Faculty of Science & Technology (formerly School of Design, Engineering and Computing and School of Applied Sciences)
  • Faculty of Media & Communication (formerly the Media School)
  • Faculty of Management (formerly the Business School and the School of Tourism)
  • Faculty of Health & Social Sciences (formerly School of Health and Social Care)

I am aware that this format will be correct for the majority of people but there are a few who will still need to go in and amend their ‘Department’ name.  An example will be those within the Business School who will move to Media & Communication rather than transfer to the newly formed Faculty of Management.  Any changes that you make will come via the RKEO for approval, which we will approve as soon as possible.  This has been done now due to the long lead in time for decisions on applications submitted to research councils.  Please note that this does not change any internal BU systems, such as RED or BRIAN.  These will be amended nearer the transition stage.

Thank you for your cooperation.

Launch of our new Research Council Application Guidance webpages!

Guidance

We have recently launched a new section on the Blog that focuses specifically on providing guidance and information about writing applications to Research Councils – you can access the information here: Research Council Application Guidance. The pages contain information about the different sections required when writing a proposal to a Research Council, including guidance on writing: the impact sections, the data management plan, and the justification of resources documents. Where possible examples of good practice are also provided. We really hope this will be a useful resource 🙂

We aim to develop this into a comprehensive suite of information for academic colleagues writing proposals to Research Councils. If you have any feedback on the pages or if there is anything you’d like to see that isn’t there yet then please let us know so it can be added.

You can access the information from the Research Toolkit link in the top menu bar of the Blog (just beneath the picture of the books) or from this handy link – Research Council Application Guidance.