2021 Marie Curie Postdoctoral Fellowship (HE-MSCA-PF-2021)

[Cr@zyChem]

I'm sure they won't have overcome the enormous technical challenge of sending 8000 simultaneous emails by Monday ( ), probably will be a rolling release over a few days.

For what I've gathered from that article posted some pages back is that EC notify successful/reserve list first. They said they can't send all emails at once, it'll take a few days for everybody to be notified.

I think they'll start Monday,but everybody should be notified until the end of next week... It sucks, bc when you start seeing people getting notified you'll know you got rejected before you even get the official email

The article you posted is the same one (from Chemistryworld) which I posted a few weeks ago, isn't it? If so, it was written in February 2021, just after the results announcement from last year, and by someone not affiliated with the EC, so we still have no real idea of what's going to happen.

It seems like the announcement will be in the portal, but will we get an email telling us to check the portal? I don't know. They should have said there will be an email when the results are ready for you to check in the portal, to stop us from constantly refreshing next week and potentially causing a DDOS attack on their servers.

You would also think/hope that if they're doing the results over several days that they would do them by panel, instead of successful applicants first. That way those who are unsuccessful aren't waiting days just for the confirmation of rejection. But then, this would require some actual thinking on the EC's part, which so far seems to have been a bit absent

Yeah, but there's an statement from an EC spokesperson in that article stating that the results are sent first to successfull applicants, what chances now is that they'll just announce on Twitter after all applicants are contacted by email about the results.

[UKR]

Time depends the gap after PhD. It was 7 years but now they made it 8 years. If you get below 70 then you cant re-submit but you can submit a new one with new topic.

First time I spent two weeks and no support then got 74.

Second time I spent 5 months and got full supports of several people and still got 84.4.

Third time (Now) I spent around 5 months and 5 people reviewed and provided comments. It was revised several times. I was told not funded.

That's odd that you've got a lower score the second time. Theoretically, if you stated that you are resubmitting, if you get a lower score than the previous year the evaluators have to to justify this and say why it was worse than the previous application.

I’m curious about the amount of times you applied - I thought it was a two time thing and you’re out. Is this not so?

[UKR]

This is minor reduction and reviewers do not need to give any justifications.

Which section score reduced?

This prompted me to check my scores:
- 1st year, no support whatsoever, but read guidelines, tutorials etc. = 85.6
- 2nd year, same project, but I followed each and every suggestion of the evaluators (including changing my host... yeah, they did that), built the proposal together with the hosts, got support from the university's research management office, attended MSCA presentations, compared with several successful applications in my section, even choose an host with a seal of excellence AND stated that it was a resubmission = 84.8 (!)
- 3rd year (this one), again corrected everything, got even further in the MSCA technical language, looked at UK successful application and included UK tricks (Vitae), watched all the videos by the MSCA about the changes in this new call, and following the advice of several "grant beasts" at my lab, re-focused the topic on my forte = still in Evaluation

...so I tend to think like another user said, despite all the efforts towards a more objective system, a bad evaluation remains possible and can screw everything up. Or you can also be lucky and get a score "above your weight", I don't know, maybe that's what happened in my first try.

Excellence 4.3 to 4.0
Impact 4.9 to 4.8
On the other hand, I grabed some points in Implementation.

[UKR]

Most probably the literature survey was not updated or some recent studies were published in the same line.
The reviewers of the second year are not the same as first year and they cant see the previous version with the comments. The second version was reviewed as a fresh submission.
It totally depends on reviewers. In another call one reviewer commented on my proposal that the team does not have previous experience in this area and provided this as a weakness and second reviewer commented 100% opposite. That was not like EC that the reviewers should reach to agreement.

Excellence… the others the same or just a little bit improved
So for this reason this year I totally Changed only that part…
Let’s hope to win the lottery this year

Which section score was reduced?

Exactly the same for me. 83 the first year and 77 the second one where I just addressed all weakness of first review… and I understood that this fellowship is like winning a lottery…

[Baka mitai]

This is minor reduction and reviewers do not need to give any justifications.

Which section score reduced?

Excellence 4.3 to 4.0
Impact 4.9 to 4.8
On the other hand, I grabed some points in Implementation.

Thank you so much for your input, I'm so glad I answered your question

[KathyHappy]

Soon, another round of panic waiting will begin... Sorry fellas I don't mean to spread anxiety, it's just, it's almost 5am in my time zone but I cannot sleep, even though I almost give up on hope already. And sadly, although desperate and struggling it is, I unfortunately found recently that I am actually like working in academia over other jobs in the industry. I mean research, not other parts. Otherwise, I cannot figure out why I am still hanging in there

[elloko]

You guys understand that grant system (especially with 10% rate) it's just elaborate lottery? Of course, if you will write the perfect proposal your chances are higher, but it doesn't mean anything. Meritocracy in science grant system is just a illusion to boost egos of people on the top of this system.

[segokucing]

You guys understand that grant system (especially with 10% rate) it's just elaborate lottery? Of course, if you will write the perfect proposal your chances are higher, but it doesn't mean anything. Meritocracy in science grant system is just a illusion to boost egos of people on the top of this system.

[iteration]

You guys understand that grant system (especially with 10% rate) it's just elaborate lottery? Of course, if you will write the perfect proposal your chances are higher, but it doesn't mean anything. Meritocracy in science grant system is just a illusion to boost egos of people on the top of this system.

Yes!!

[Steminist]

Hey guys!

I think we are quite close to have the results. I do not know what I am gonna do later but for sure, i am less stressful than the last week maybe i am not that excited anymore, just waiting to receive the score

For the records and sharing about getting help; last year i applied without any help, followed the net4mobility book and scored barely above 70. Reviwers destroyed me in the implementation section (even the impact was quite close to perfect). This year i changed my host and i got extremely surprised about how the host institution could be helpful. They were checking the all the words and sentences in the template and asked me to write even one sentence to address them. For example; this year the section for the impact of sex was not limited to only sex and I was advised 1000 times to insert one sentence about the impact of race, ethicity etc. even my proposal was not addressing these points. They said reviewers check and they might say that i did not consider this section bla bla. They evaluated each section one by one without touching the scientific part. So we will see if this works or not But personally; i agree with some comments, if reviewers like the idea, you score high and these small details make the difference between being in main list or reserved list. If they don’t like the idea, whatever you write, it will not work. Ah but to like or not like something is also relative ^