Funder’s website
The funder’s website can be found HERE.
Funding Value and Duration
Connection Grants supporting events are valued at $7,000 to $25,000 over 1 year.
Connection Grants supporting outreach activities are valued at $7,000 to $50,000 over 1 year.
A minimum request of $7,000 is required.
SSHRC is willing to consider amounts higher than $50,000, although such applications must satisfactorily justify the need for the higher amount, as well as provide evidence the entire award can be managed within the one-year timeframe.
Overview
Connection Grants are expected to respond to the objectives of the Connection program.
These grants support events and outreach activities geared toward short-term, targeted knowledge mobilization initiatives. These events and activities represent opportunities to exchange knowledge and to engage with participants on research issues of value to them. Events and outreach activities funded by a Connection Grant can often serve as a first step toward more comprehensive and longer-term projects.
Connection Grants support workshops, colloquiums, conferences, forums, summer institutes, or other events or outreach activities that facilitate:
- disciplinary and/or interdisciplinary exchanges in the social sciences and humanities.
- scholarly exchanges between those working in the social sciences and humanities and those working in other research fields.
- intersectoral exchanges between academic researchers in the social sciences and humanities and researchers and practitioners from the public, private and/or not-for-profit sectors; and/or
- international research collaboration and scholarly exchanges with researchers, students and non-academic partners from other countries.
Only a Canadian institution that holds institutional eligibility can administer funds. However, the intellectual leadership and governance for Connection Grant activities can come from within the research community and/or from within the public, private and/or not-for-profit sectors.
SSHRC welcomes applications involving Indigenous research, as well as those involving research-creation.
Eligibility Criteria
Subject matter
Most SSHRC funding is awarded through open competitions. Proposals can involve any disciplines, thematic areas, approaches or subject areas eligible for SSHRC funding. See the guidelines on subject matter eligibility for more information.
Projects whose primary objective is to conduct research activities (e.g., literature reviews, field work, data collection, interviews) or to develop stand-alone volumes are not eligible for funding under this funding opportunity.
Proposed events and outreach activities
- All activities must take place within 12 months of the start date indicated on the notice of award (see decision dates in the funding cycle schedule).
- Proposed events and outreach activities must produce timely and concrete deliverables, such as conference proceedings or other knowledge products developed for traditional formats and/or employing digital and/or multimedia formats (unless specifically intended to create new, longer-term linkages or to initiate collaboration).
- Proposed events and outreach activities can be one-time encounters or catalysts designed to lead to longer-term partnerships and/or sustained programs of scholarly research.
Events
Events are short-term activities that are usually completed in a week or less (e.g., a two-day conference or a one-week workshop). The bulk of the activities will happen within this short period. As part of the overall proposal, applicants can request support for longer-term activities directly related to the event (e.g., developing proceedings, publications or reports, or other forms of knowledge synthesis).
Proposed events can be:
- face-to-face or involve virtual interaction.
- discipline-specific, or cross-disciplinary and/or cross-sectoral; and
- open- or closed-invitation.
Outreach activities
Proposed outreach activities must be designed to engage a broader public in social sciences and humanities knowledge through one or a combination of the following: knowledge dissemination, transfer, brokering, translation, synthesis, exchange, networking or co-creation beyond what would typically be achieved through an event. Proposed activities can include, but are not limited to:
- adaptation (including translation, for example, into French, English or Indigenous languages) of texts or presentations for the purpose of broader knowledge mobilization to different audiences.
- development of policy briefs, knowledge syntheses and scoping reviews.
- development of articles for print or online publication in newspapers or weekly or monthly magazines—whether specialized or general interest.
- virtual networking.
- media events (such as television/radio presentations).
- summer schools/institutes.
- speaker series.
- public debates.
- artistic exhibits, performances or festivals.
- development/use of interactive technologies, audiovisual products or software; and/or
- development/use of educational aids, instruments or equipment.
Projects can occur in Canada or abroad. If a proposed project is to occur abroad, the applicant must justify the project’s potential to mobilize Canadian research on an international stage, and why the project must happen outside Canada.
Connection Grants are intended to support applicants and project directors who are running a knowledge mobilization event or outreach activity. Applicants must provide evidence that they are playing an active and significant role in the organization and delivery of the event or outreach activity.
Ineligible activities
Although applicants can apply for Connection Grants to support eligible events and outreach activities organized by academic associations, the following association activities are not eligible for funding:
- annual general meetings or any other activity directly related to an association’s business meetings.
- book launches or similar report dissemination.
- receptions for association members; and
- any activities normally paid for by the association’s operating fees.
Participants and audiences
Participants or audiences, in Canada and abroad, for both events and outreach activities, can include, among others:
- academic researchers.
- non-academic researchers.
- policymakers.
- professional practitioners.
- representatives from public, private or not-for-profit organizations.
- representatives from community-based, local or regional non-academic organizations; and/or
- students at all levels.
Applicants
Applications can be submitted by institutions or by individual applicants and teams (consisting of one applicant or project director and one or more co-applicants and/or collaborators).
Institutional Connection Grant applications must be submitted by a Canadian institution that holds institutional eligibility to conduct an event, outreach activity or a combination of the two that allows the institution to achieve strategic objectives relevant to its mission and mandate. The project director must be affiliated with the host institution (the applicant), prepare the application on behalf of the host institution and be responsible for the overall leadership of the project. The term “institution” from this point on in this description refers to both postsecondary institutions and not‑for‑profit organizations.
Individual Connection Grant applicants (except postdoctoral researchers) must be affiliated with a Canadian postsecondary institution that holds institutional eligibility at the time of application. Applicants conduct an event, outreach activity or a combination of the two that primarily falls in their areas of expertise and will allow them to make a significant contribution to their field of research. In the case of a team approach, all team members must meet the eligibility criteria specific to their role.
See the section below on Institutions for more information.
Researchers who maintain an affiliation with a Canadian postsecondary institution, but whose primary affiliation is with a non-Canadian postsecondary institution, are not eligible for applicant or project director status.
Applicants or project directors who have received a SSHRC grant of any type but have failed to submit an achievement report by the deadline specified in their notice of award are not eligible to apply for another SSHRC grant until they have submitted the report.
Postdoctoral researchers are eligible to be applicants or project directors if they have formally established an affiliation with an institution that holds institutional eligibility within three months of the grant start date and maintain such an affiliation for the duration of the grant period.
Students enrolled in a program of study are not eligible to apply.
Connection Grant proposals led by students can be submitted, provided the proposals involve both students and researchers and are submitted on behalf of the student by a faculty member at an eligible Canadian postsecondary institution. Students can be collaborators, but not co-applicants. Students who are collaborators on a project team cannot be paid a stipend or wage by the grant.
Federal scientists who are affiliated with a Canadian postsecondary institution must demonstrate that their proposed research or research-related activity is not related to either the mandate of their employer or the normal duties for which they receive payment from that employer.
If the proposal falls within the mandate of the federal government and the research or research-related activity is performed in government facilities, funding can be allocated for student salaries or stipends and travel costs only.
Institutions
Grant funds can only be administered by an eligible Canadian institution. Institutions proposing to administer a grant awarded under this funding opportunity must hold or obtain institutional eligibility. See SSHRC’s list of eligible institutions.
All not-for-profit organizations that require institutional eligibility must contact institutional.eligibility@sshrc-crsh.gc.ca at least five business days prior to the application deadline to be added to the application form and begin the eligibility process.
Indigenous not-for-profit organizations wanting to administer multiple Partnership Development Grants, Partnership Grants and/or Connection Grants going forward are encouraged to begin the institutional eligibility application process at least two months prior to the relevant funding opportunity’s application deadline.
Institutions must contact institutional.eligibility@sshrc-crsh.gc.ca to begin the institutional eligibility application process, or if they have questions about institutional eligibility.
Co-applicants
Individuals (including postdoctoral researchers) are eligible to be co-applicants if they are formally affiliated with any of the following:
- Canadian eligible postsecondary institutions; not-for-profit organizations; philanthropic foundations; think tanks; or municipal, territorial or provincial governments; or
- International postsecondary institutions.
Collaborators
Any individual who makes a significant contribution to the project is eligible to be a collaborator. Collaborators do not need to be affiliated with an eligible Canadian postsecondary institution.
Individuals from the private sector or federal government can only participate as collaborators.
Multiple applications and holding multiple awards
Individuals can apply, as an applicant, for only one Connection Grant per calendar year. An applicant cannot apply for or hold more than one Connection Grant for the same event or outreach activity.
Applicants or project directors on an active SSHRC Connection Grant cannot apply as applicant or project director for another individual or institutional Connection Grant.
See SSHRC’s regulations on multiple applications and holding multiple awards for more information.
Monitoring
Grant holders will be expected to report on the use of grant funds, on funded activities undertaken during the grant period, and on outcomes. Successful applicants will be informed of reporting requirements when they receive their notice of award.
Internal Contacts
Potential applicants are encouraged to discuss this funding opportunity with their Faculty Research Facilitator.
Deadlines
| Faculty Deadline | Please contact your Faculty Research Facilitator. |
| OVPRI Approval Form Deadline |
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| Submission to Sponsor |
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Submitting Your Application
- Step 1) Submit an internal Carleton Approval Form
Submit an internal Approval Form through our central awards management database CUResearch:
https://ovpri.research.carleton.ca/Romeo.Researcher/Administrator/Default.aspx
For a user’s guide on submitting an Approval Form, click HERE. - Step 2) Submit an external application to the granting agency
Submit an external application to the corresponding grant or award agency. To navigate to the funder’s website, click HERE