Incubator Grants

Prospective teams are invited to submit their Incubator ideas before 26 May 2025. Awarded Incubators teams are expected to attend the Kickstarter on 16 October to develop their ideas and consortia through an open process of co-creation. Please save the date in your calendars!

Prospective teams are invited to send in their idea with the following information: 

• Title 

• Applicant and inter-/transdisciplinary team (if known). Active involvement of scholars from multiple disciplines and external partners is encouraged. We can support applicant teams in finding partners, both in the run up to and during the Kickstarter workshop event.  

• Short description of the challenge you wish to address (max. 500 words) 

• Short motivation of why this challenge requires a transdisciplinary approach, reflecting on the expertise, input, faculty and stakeholder involvement that you feel are necessary to help address this challenge (max. 500 words). Note that we do not expect applicant teams to have a complete overview and that the Kickstarter workshop and Incubator process can be used to complement what you know. 

We invite applicant teams to focus on the process of collaboration and on the potential contribution of the project idea to the Pathways to Sustainability mission and objectives. In developing the Incubator ideas, we encourage applicant teams to consult our Transdisciplinary Field Guide.

The Kickstarter workshop on 16 October marks the formal start of the Incubators. The Kickstarter workshop is part of the procedure for the Incubator grant and awarded teams are expected to participate and have an open attitude to the process of co-creation that will be facilitated by this event. At Pathways to Sustainability, we believe that such an open process is key to transformative learning. 

In preparation of the Kickstarter workshop, our Communities and Programme Board will help Incubator teams with targeting participants for the workshop sessions (UU colleagues and external stakeholders).  

The Kickstarter workshop will feature sessions which will enable the selected Incubator teams to develop their ideas in collaboration with others and further build their inter-/transdisciplinary teams. 

• Open and Inclusive Attitude: This workshop event aims to be interactive and dynamic and to assist teams with the co-creation of their project ideas. Pathways commits to an open and inclusive design and assessment procedure in which initial ideas may change with the input and integration of various types of expertise. Ideas are welcome from all participants at the event. 

• Community Support: A delegation of our community leaders, programme board members and project managers will be present to provide feedback and answer questions. The programme will further offer insights and examples from running and previous Incubators and Signature Projects.  

• Inter-/transdisciplinary teams: The active involvement by scholars from multiple disciplines and external partners is welcomed. We will support applicant teams in further assembling their team prior to the Kickstarter workshop. Ultimately, Incubators are led by an inter-/transdisciplinary project team comprised of UU scholars from at least three disciplines, with possible collaboration with external scholars and/or stakeholders.

In the months after the Kickstarter workshop, a meeting will be scheduled between the newly awarded Incubator teams and a liaison contact member from the Programme Board to discuss the activities and latest developments. In this initiation phase, we seek to stay in touch with Incubator teams to provide feedback and guidance where necessary, answer any questions, explore further possibilities for collaboration, and help teams determine the appropriate next steps. Additionally, we aim to follow the incubation process closely for learning purposes, to, in the future, develop tools to facilitate cross-Incubator learning and to improve our procedures. 

Incubator Grants need to be spent within 12 months after allocation.

Aims

The Pathways to Sustainability mission is to propel radical innovation in our university practices by creating vibrant communities and fostering new collaborations in research and education, both within the university and with societal stakeholders, to enhance our impact on the exploration and development of pathways to sustainability, guided by the principle that scientific rigor meets societal relevance. This mission is carried out, in part, by funding initiatives that adhere to the principles and contribute to realizing the aims defined in the 2022-2025 strategy:

• Be the driver of change fostering sustainable thinking and practice, via the creation of spaces for innovation, interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary interaction, bringing together students and scholars from both early to established moments in their careers working on sustainability issues across the many different institutes and departments
• Fulfilling the critical role that belongs to universities, not only thinking along but also critiquing developments where appropriate and coming up with new imaginative ideas about what sustainable futures may look like and how we might get there.
• Finding new ways to connect our proven excellence in research and education to processes of societal learning, creating more direct links with policy makers and stakeholders and society at large (transdisciplinarity).

Criteria

A pre-selection of submitted Incubator ideas takes place by an assessment committee composed of Programme and Community Board members, based on the following criteria:

• Applications should contribute to accelerating change through initiatives that are new within the UU and/or are not easily funded via other channels;
• Applications will be challenge-based: initiatives are formulated and designed in such a way that they resonate within multiple Pathways Communities and inspire collaboration across these Communities;
• Applications will stimulate the integration of different types of expertise through transdisciplinary collaborations;
• Applications should aim to create time and space for (early-career) scholars to make an active contribution;
• Applicants commit themselves to the open and inclusive design process in which initial ideas may change with the input and integration of various types of expertise. They also commit themselves to peer-assessment once they submit an application;
• Trust in our scholars and in the process is key. We aim to facilitate as many promising initiatives as possible. To be able to do so, we encourage applicants to only apply for necessary costs.