Recruitment

Sixteen 3-year positions (starting July 1st, 2010) as Early Stage Researchers (ESRs) were available to work in the MIBISOC project. We were looking to recruit Early Stage Researchers with less than 4 years of research experience after graduation. Selected candidates will have the opportunity to study for a research-level degree (PhD) and work within a highly collaborative and interdisciplinary network of leading researchers.

Deadline First call: 28/02/2010. First call decision by 24th May 2010

Deadline Second call: 14/05/2010. Second call decision by 28th May 2010

Job description

The MIBISOC network offers to the selected ESRs an intensive research training programme between 12 participating institutions. The successful candidate will be expected to take part actively in the training activities organized by MIBISOC (courses, secondments, workshops, etc) and to develop her/his research project.

Benefits

Employment contract with full social security. The contract will be with the partner employing. The salary of the PhD positions is set in accordance with the regulations of the Marie Curie Initial Training Network (http://ec.europa.eu/research/mariecurieactions/careers_en.htm) within the European Commission’s 7th Framework Programme, the labour laws and regulations of the hosting institution and its country. Additional, non-salaried, non-taxable contributions toward moving and travel to MIBISOC activities and conferences are available from MIBISOC’s funds.

The selection of ESR followed a process based on:

• Equal access opportunities between men and women
• The academic and scientific skills and the relevance of their experience with the research area
• The expected impact of the proposed training on the researchers’ career
• The conformity with the required criteria for eligibility of the researchers within Marie Curie Initial Training Networks.

The EU has strict eligibility criteria for Early Stage researchers:

• Applicants should be in the first 4 years (full-time equivalent) of their research careers, including the period of research training, starting at the date of obtaining the degree which would formally entitle them to embark on a doctorate. Students who are completing their master’s degree during the current semester, with the intention of starting the doctoral position in the spring semester of 2010, are also invited to apply. The qualifying education must be completed before enrolment in the MIBISOC project.
• The researcher shall not be a national of a State in which the beneficiary's research team appointing her/him is located.
• At the time of appointment, the researcher should not have resided or carried out her/his main activity in the country of the beneficiary for more than 12 months in the 3 years immediately  prior to her/his appointment
• Applicants need to have a good working knowledge of English, as all the scientific communication and the MIBISOC events will be in English.

Statistic of the Mibisoc Recruitment Process

During the first hiring round (closed by the end of February), 78 applications were received with 62 of them (79,5%) being eligible. The 58,1% of the applications were from non European citizens and the 30,7% were women (with 43,37% of them being European). The second round was opened from the 15th of April to the 15th of May. During this second call we received 21 new applications and 20 of the first call applicants expressed their interest in still being considered in the selection process. The 14,63% of this 41 applications were not eligible. The 31,43% corresponded to European citizens. Among the eligible candidates, the 31,7% were women, with the 66,67% of them being European. The final decisions were made by the 28th of May. The 81,25% of the 16 selected candidates were European, 25% of them being women. We finally managed to recruit a percentage of women similar than the percentage of female applications received, and than the average of graduated women in computing (41%), and engineering, (25%), so we are quite satisfied.