1. Members of the ISN Schools Committee (the committee) will be appointed by ISN Council and should serve an initial term of two years (renewable). The committee will publicize and solicit proposals and approve proposals, and evaluate reports from the school organizers. The committee will be made up of members representing each geographical region (Asia-Pacific, Europe, Africa, and the Americas) along with the ISN Officers as ex-officio members.
2. Proposals may be submitted from scientists and educators of the different regions at any time. The organizers will be responsible for the planning, organization and financial management of each school.
3. An ISN School should focus on an area of neurochemistry considered in its broadest cellular, molecular and clinical context within neuroscience.
4. The curriculum of the ISN School should be designed to suit the skill levels of the respective student population. Topics may be quite basic to allow the training of relatively inexperienced neuroscientists or of high contemporary relevance to provide updates on latest developments in neurochemistry. These ISN Schools may be of a number of types consisting of formal lectures or hand-on laboratory-based sessions, or a mix of both types of activities. All students at ISN Schools will be encouraged to present their own research activities.
5. Proposals must be submitted at least 4 months in advance to the Chair of the School Committee. The date of receipt for applications for 2010 is 15 December 2009. Application forms will be available on the ISN website. The proposal should contain:
a: A short description of the school including its goals, the target student population, the geographical distribution of the student population, a syllabus outline, and facilities and other resources available to the school.
b. A list of the faculty, including the following information (institutional affiliation and research area) and their role in the school.
c. A description of the means to transport and house students and faculty (if relevant).
d. A detailed budget including other sources of funds that are available or planned.
e. Written approval to hold an ISN School from the Institution hosting the ISN School (if relevant).
6. Funding:
a. The current annual amounts budgeted for the schools by region are:
· · · · 1. Asian Pacific Region: up to $40,000.
· · · · 2. European Region; up to $40,000.
· · · · 3. African Region: up to $30,000.
· · · · 4. American Region: up to $40,000.
b. The schools committee will be directly responsible for the determination of the level of funding of each individual ISN School within the annual allocation of funds provided by ISN Council for each geographical region. The total funds budgeted for each year need not be spent each year if the number or quality of applications does not meet expected levels established by the committee. Funds do not accrue if they are not expended within the ISN’s fiscal year.
c. Organizers of ISN Schools may seek additional financial support from government bodies, other societies, philanthropic organizations, academic institutes and industry where these might be available.
d. Funding may only be used for activities within that School.
e. Once a school proposal is approved by the Chair of the committee the ISN Treasurer will make 80% of the funding available in advance to the organizers. Once a report is received from the organizers and approved by the schools committee the 20% balance of the funds will be paid to the organizers. Earlier release of the 20% balance may be considered in exceptional cases, but must be approved in advance by the ISN Treasurer.
f. Funds will be sent to an account of the organizers’ institution or a bank account established to finance the school. Other arrangements may be considered, but must be approved in advance by the ISN Treasurer. Funding cannot be paid into individual (non-institutional) bank accounts.
g. No other ISN funds should be used to augment the budgets of the schools.
7. Post-meeting Report:
Upon completion of the school the organizers will be responsible for the preparation and submission of a report to the Chair of the Schools Committee within one month after the conclusion of ISN School. This report should describe the activities undertaken, the breakdown of disbursement of funds (including allocations of travel grants to students & faculty), other funding received from other sources, and list all people (affiliations & countries) who received ISN funding. At least one photograph (suitable for reproduction) should be included of all attendees at the School to allow for publicity of the ISN Schools Initiative. The report will be evaluated the Schools Committee and once approved the residual 20% of the funds will be released to the organizers and the report posted on the ISN website. Failure to provide a timely and informative report will result in the forfeiture of the 20% residual funds.
8. Publicity:
The committee and the ISN Secretary should aggressively publicize this initiative throughout the international neuroscience community. Effort should be made to solicit proposals from organizers from outside the customary groups that receive funds from the ISN in order to widen the ISN’s impact on neurochemical education. At the discretion of the committee and the approval of the Treasurer a small portion of the funds (<10%) of a region’s funds may be used to publicize this initiative in appropriate newsletters, publications, and web sites.
9. Acknowledgement:
Schools funded by ISN will be designated ISN Schools. ISN’s financial support has to be acknowledged in the school documents and the ISN’s logo shown in the school material and announcements.
10. Metrics:
The committee will collect data on the outcomes of the schools such as the subsequent careers of students and the number of publications arising from students that attended the schools in order to rationally evaluate the program.
11. Duration:
The initial program will be reviewed by Council in 2010 at which time the Council will decide whether the program was successful and whether it should continue.
Inquiries and formal applications should be sent by Email to:
Prof. Roger Butterworth
Chair, ISN Schools Initiative
roger.butterworth@umontreal.ca
Application Form
Schools supported by the ISN Schools Initiative Reports.