Once you have decided to join METEOR, you will fill in a participation form with some basic details about you and my research interests and giving consent to the use of your data.

The following questions and answers are designed to provide further information, such as: What will I be doing before the first METEOR Academy? Who will be in my group? Will we have shared or different interests? What will we do after the first Academy? How often will we meet and how? How will we get to know each other?

You will be assigned to a Peer Mentoring Group (PMG) with 5-6 others.  Your first meeting will be online, to introduce yourselves and become acquainted. There will be a guideline for this, with suggestions for the amount of time each person spends on an introduction, what kind of information should be shared, who should chair the meeting, and other practical details.

Chairing is necessary to keep the meeting focused and within the allocated time. The chair should be rotated around the group from meeting to meeting. The first chair should be a volunteer from the group.

We will suggest some optional icebreaker activities for first meetings, and you may have some of your own. These are designed to create an informal and sharing atmosphere.

Group members should give some personal information, explain which institution they are from, what is their discipline and PhD topic, what their expectations are

Yes. There will be a designated mentor for each group. Mentors will be from one of the partner universities and will be responsible for answering your questions, dealing with problems and generally ensuring that everything goes well. The underlying principle of PMGs, however, is that groups should be as autonomous as possible. So mentors will not be on call 24/7 but will have ‘office hours’ when you can contact them. They will not attend all your online meetings but there will be a schedule for prearranged progress meetings, probably once a month, as you might have with your PhD supervisor. However, it is important to know that they will not be ‘supervising’ the content of your joint project, but are there for support, answering questions and solving problems that can’t be fixed by the PMGs.

There will be 5-7 persons in a group. Each person should come from a different institution, although sometimes it might be a different department/faculty in the same institution depending on numbers. Each person should come from a different country. Each person has their own PhD or ECR project. Some of you will be in the early stages of your PhDs whilst others may have already graduated and will be researching or working on a project.  One of the objectives of the group is to support each other’s language skills, as well as working together on the course material and the TRIP (Transformative Research & Innovation Proposal). The overall language of the project is English.

Having a PMG means that you support each other emotionally, technically and creatively. The PMG is greater than the sum of its parts. Each member has knowledge, skills or qualities that no-one else has, and is willing to share these. METEOR is designed to maximise the use of these unique characteristics for mutual support. This should make it easier and more enjoyable to work on your own PhD or other projects, and to conclude that project successfully.

There are very few research and innovation topics that could not benefit from a multi- disciplinary perspective. As the world becomes more and more dependent on technology, it also becomes dependent on understanding how things work at a systemic level, rather than in isolation. If we take transport as an example, it has, in no particular order:

• a geographical dimension
• a sociological dimension
• an engineering dimension
• a climate science dimension
• a historical dimension
• an economic dimension
• and many more

Unfortunately, academic self-interest and a compartmentalised education system have made it difficult to pursue inter-disciplinary studies at a high level. But they are essential for solving societal challenges effectively. Therefore, METEOR groups will comprise a mix of disciplines. The exact mix will depend on who signs up for the project, but a typical group might contain an engineer, an economist, someone from business or management, a geographer, someone from teacher education and a biologist. One of the first tasks will be to create a model of your group’s skill set.

We don’t! But we can’t know who would be the best fit to anyone else without some experimentation. There will be possibilities for changing the composition of your group, but some restrictions will apply. We will encourage participants to work with people that they have never met, from countries they have never visited and from disciplines that they don’t understand. This matches what often happens in the world of work, especially in industry.

The first assignment is to check that everyone has a common understanding of the purpose of METEOR, how the project will work, and what are the benefits for participants and others. So you need to discuss what your impressions are, based on material in Training Resource (TR) 3a, and produce a group output in the form of a poster (in PowerPoint) that explains METEOR to the world! These will be uploaded to the learning platform and reviewed by the mentoring team. You will receive feedback on your poster.

There will be a webinar before the first round of meetings where we will explain any areas where there might be confusion. This will help the METEOR team to revise the materials in TR3a and elsewhere. Although there are certain things we have to do because they are specified in our agreement with the European Commission, we have quite a lot of freedom to adjust our methods and content. So we will ensure that your views are taken into account and fed back into the overall programme.

Round one is to enable groups to meet face-to-face and to practice things that they have learned from the training resources and by working in PMGs. Round two, after an interval of approximately 12 months, is to give groups the opportunity to present their completed proposals. We will explain about the proposals below.

There are two parts of the process. Groups need to apply collectively, with some exceptions. In round one, there will be opportunities to meet with other groups and to interact individually with other participants. However, the booking process is at group level. As a group you will discuss and (hopefully) agree on a venue that works for everyone, with a second and third choice. Then, you will produce a very brief proposal justifying your first choice and providing an estimated travel budget for the group, based on the principle of minimising carbon emissions. There will be a deadline for doing this, which will allow for at least two months lead time until your actual travel. Places will be allocated based on proposals (lowest carbon first). If your first choice is already full, you will be allocated to your second choice and so on.

METEOR will pay 100% of your actual travel and accommodation costs. Venues will arrange bed and breakfast accommodation in hotels or student halls and will also provide catering at the event. We are unable to pay for family members or other accompanying persons unless you have special requirements. The hosting institution will deal with your travel expenses.

The focus will be on group activities, mutual knowledge sharing and preparation for the next stage of METEOR. There will be input from the METEOR team and from groups themselves, for example presenting their members, their PhD or other projects and launching ideas. There will be an extensive social programme. Of course, there will be some variation between locations, but our objective is to keep the format the same so that no-one misses out!

If one or more members can’t go for any reason, that is not a problem. It is up to the group to communicate with them and keep them up to speed with developments. We are not intending to hold hybrid meetings as such but for some of the group activities at the school it might be possible for groups to be online with their missing members.

The next stage is to work through Training Resource 3f, Research and Innovation Project Design, whilst starting to think about what your group would like to work on. At this stage, we need to give you some guidance in the form of a METEOR Call for Proposals and an associated proposal template. Your proposal is called a TRIP (Transformative Research and Innovation Proposal).

By focusing on transformative research and innovation, we are shifting the emphasis of research away from academia and the research publishing ecosystem. We are looking for ideas that address current societal challenges, broadly around the framework of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the various ‘missions’ and ‘destinations’ of the EU Horizon programme. This involves thinking more broadly about what research and innovation are designed to achieve.

However, in order to develop an idea to a stage where it is viable and can be put into practice, many details have to be worked out. The process of writing a proposal is where this happens. Proposals are common in many work situations, from consultancy to school improvement plans and from EU Horizon projects to your local community. Preparing a proposal in METEOR immerses you in a purposeful group process with exciting results!

In theory, it would be great for the project if things like this happen!  The METEOR Call will reflect the European Commission’s concepts of Responsible Research and innovation, and Open Science, so we are committed to keeping our activities open and transparent, and to treating everyone equally.  If this situation arises, you should contact your group mentor as soon as possible and discuss the possibilities. Most likely, we would recommend that you pursue your commercial project outside the project, with or without participation in other ongoing METEOR activities. This kind of outcome is not specifically discouraged, but it is not the central mission of METEOR.

Your TRIP might be viable as a funding proposal for a national research council or a European/international funding programme. Alternatively, your group dynamic might enable you to make a different proposal for one of these. In addition, you are free to interact with other groups or individual participants, if this would help to move things forward. Our main aim is to enhance your skills in formulating ideas and showing how they can be put into practice.

One person’s isolation is another person’s freedom. But no-one is ever truly alone. As a solo researcher, you still engage with others as research subjects, authors, readers or supervisors. METEOR is designed to support all kinds of interactions within existing or potential research ecosystems. The group activities are an organisational tool and support mechanism but also a venue for developing individual skills.

Dealing with interpersonal issues is an important skill and we will help you to improve or use your existing skills in this area. If the problem cannot be solved through dialogue, or if it involves serious misconduct, this should be raised with your group mentor. The member in question may be asked to move to another group or be removed from the project.

All institutions have signed letters of commitment to the project and have implicitly undertaken to facilitate student/ECR participation. Supervisors stand to benefit from more motivated students, and from professional development provided for them in TR3d, Supervision and Mentoring. Of course, supervisors want their students to focus on, and complete, their PhDs, but there needs to be a wider discussion of the purpose of the PhD. Is it a research project, or a process of skills acquisition? These two things are not incompatible, but embedded beliefs and governance systems often foreclose discussion of the overall purpose of doctoral programmes.

METEOR will invite its PMGs to submit proposals for original research and innovation projects with scientific excellence, positive societal impact and a plan for efficient implementation.

The proposal will include an indicative budget, and statements on gender, diversity and ethics.

A template will be provided. There will be an overall page limit and word limits within sections. The template will reflect the format of current EU and national templates. However, we recognise that various unchallenged assumptions permeate these templates and the associated calls. One of these assumptions is that so-called ‘(scientific) excellence’ should take precedence over impact. Furthermore, impact itself is often reduced to indicators of ‘reach’ rather than actual changes to practice. This has been an ongoing problem in EU and national research policy for many years.

‘Reach’ is usually described in terms of target audiences and what they learn about project activities and results. However, knowing about something does not equate to acting upon it. External constraints often prevent new practices being adopted. Priorities change and the fixed-term concept of project timelines does not permit follow-up activities or monitoring of long-term impact. There is sometimes a degree of continuity between calls that creates a cumulative effect, but this is rarely systematic. There is also tension between the justifiable intention to spread research and innovation funding as widely as possible, versus the potential benefits of re-funding successful projects run by ‘the usual suspects’.

The research and innovation philosophy of METEOR is eco-outwards. This means that the proposed projects should not only increase knowledge but should also design innovative ways of using that knowledge. Furthermore, the proposed projects should have benefits for natural or human ecosystems, even if indirectly.

This is a doctoral-level programme, and we therefore expect ideas to reflect the state of the art across the various disciplines involved. Interdisciplinarity within the groups should lead to boundary-crossing projects that disrupt conventional expectations. These are the TRIPS.

The reason we are using proposals as a core activity is that they require research-based knowledge but are not expected to involve time-intensive fieldwork. The ‘Excellence’ section of each proposal should contain some references to relevant literature, and should set out a coherent, interdisciplinary or transdisciplinary, theoretical framework for the proposed action. The word ‘action’ is important, since we expect that the core idea can be implemented in some way. Implementation could be in the form of policies, systems, artefacts or devices, social innovations and much more. The implementation can, of course, require that further research being carried out in the course of the project but there should be an argument for feasibility based on current knowledge.

This is a crucial point since it relates to the purpose of the PhD. We are used to seeing PhD research as both an end in itself and a step towards fulfilment of a greater research goal, as is common in laboratory research. The purpose of METEOR is to expand your research horizon, to connect what you do and what you know to other bodies of knowledge in order to transform the world in a positive way. This is rhetoric, but the invisible force at work here is value.

We rarely think about the value of research financially, since this is seen as being against the spirit of scientific freedom. Nevertheless, it is curious that we seem prepared to spend billions of Euros on large physics projects and next to nothing on educational research. This in turn leads to consideration of impact.

In research circles, there is much talk of high impact journals, and citation indices as indicators of impact. This is a closed, inward-looking perspective on impact. As an academic, having an article published in Nature is seen as having significant impact, regardless of any effects outside academia. An eco-outwards perspective would also consider the effects on people or the environment. This perspective often encounters resistance from scientists who have spent years making superb proposals in their own areas and who have achieved impressive results, without having to write a single word of justification for why their research should be valued over other topics.

This is why the inter-disciplinary focus of METEOR is important. It is not a case of criticizing astro-physics for wanting to know about gravitational waves, but rather, of using the incredibly creative thinking of astrophysics to enhance other areas. We know, for example, that the development of High-Performance Computing methods in astrophysics has led to applications in medical science. We also know, but rarely consider, that astrophysics is an art form. Visual representations of galaxies, supernovae and other phenomena are powerful stimulants to thought about our own existence and our place in the universe.

The central concept of value, and the valuation of impact, will be a theme of TR3g, Impact and Behavioural Change. As I write, Trump is illustrating the creation of impact by sudden implementation of tariffs on imports to the US from Canada, Mexico and China.  Experts are convinced that this will be disastrous for almost all stakeholders, but Trump himself has gained short-term credibility by getting something done. However, it is clear that he did not submit a carefully researched proposal for his action. Part of the big picture in METEOR is to show that the proposal writing process is not just an irritating chore that academics have to do in order to fund their research or please their institution. It should be a fundamental dimension of how we do things.

Making a ‘business case’ for something is a variation on the proposal, but here we often encounter a lack of stakeholder or interdisciplinary perspectives. In TRIPS, we will include a business canvas (we’ll explain this concept thoroughly in TR3i) outline, which will require you to think about the creation and measurement of value in your proposed project. Preparing this canvas does not mean that your idea has to be commercially viable, although it could be. Rather, it should demonstrate that the value of its outputs exceeds the value of its inputs (i.e. the requested funding).

This will require the groups to apply creative thinking and imaginative measurement methods or indicators. For example, how do we measure the success, or impact, of arts-based projects? Conflict reduction? Reduced incidence of mental health issues? Better achievement in maths classes? It is not for us to tell you the answers, but we will help you think through the issues.

TRIPS: Case Study: Urban Transportation

Urban transportation is a massive field that potentially gathers a wide range of disciplines and stakeholders. It is often thought that solutions involve big infrastructure projects such as Metro systems or tramlines. But solutions such as the ’15 minute neighbourhood’ seek to reduce the need for long distance transportation in the first place. You might think that all possible solutions in this space have already been tried. Take electric scooters. These have become common in many cities, but there is a downside in terms of nuisance from abandoned scooters, and the actual system is not very sustainable due to the need for collection and central recharging. An innovative proposal might:

1) Find an engineering solution to the charging problem

2) Find a social solution to abandoned or stolen scooters

3) Find a new business model that enables long-term sustainability and value creation

4) Or ??? Maybe scooters are not the answer!