The assessment process for the Caribbean PhD Scholarships has officially started. There has been considerable interest in the scholarship programme, and this was reflected in the 126 statements of intent submitted. Following on from these, 72 pre-proposals have been selected for the next phase. The proposals are now being assessed by an independent assessment committee which will advise on which candidates should be given the opportunity to develop a full proposal
Verification and delay
Since the deadline of 15 September, NWO has been verifying the admissibility of all the pre-proposals received. Candidates were given several opportunities to amend their forms and that caused a certain amount of delay during that phase. However, it was considered important to provide these amendment opportunities in order to give everyone a fair chance.
Composition of the assessment committee
The programme team has selected 27 independent committee members who have expertise in the relevant research fields. There was an extra focus on members from the Caribbean region to ensure proper representation of the Caribbean context in the research. This is an important factor for being able to perform an adequate assessment of the pre-proposals. Details of the members of the assessment committee can be found on the NWO website.
Timeline
The committee members are going to be working on their assessments until the second half of January. This will provide a basis for making a selection from the complete applications, and candidates will then be interviewed during the summer of 2026. A total of 7 PhD Scholarships are available. To prevent unnecessary workload, NWO aims to admit 21 candidates to the final round.
Background
The first phase of the new PhD scholarships funding instrument of the Caribbean Research Programme was developed in the period from 2024 to 2025 in consultation with (prospective) doctoral candidates from the Caribbean part of the Kingdom and the universities of Aruba, Curaçao and St. Maarten. The experiences gained from this first phase will be used when working with the same parties to improve the next round of Caribbean PhD scholarships.
More information
Detailed information on the assessment procedure, selection criteria and the timeline can be found in the full-length Call for Proposals. If you have any questions, please contact the support team via [email protected].
