1st time poster here. I had been following this thread and wanted to ask a couple questions to fellow GRFP applicants. I should start by saying that that I was not recommended for a fellowship and this was my last and only attempt. I know there is no appealing the decision, and I am not really trying to, but I wanted to hear from some other people on the feedback they received and maybe get some advice.
While I was obviously disappointed that I did not receive an award I was pretty upset about one of the reviewers comments that strongly implied they had barely read my application. Here's some context.
My proposal was in the field of ecology and the project involved urban ecology specifically. Due to the nature and design of the project I would need to almost exclusively use private lands in my work. I proposed that I would gain access to private lands by speaking to local Audubon Societies (my project involved birds), conservation organizations, and neighborhood organizations, hoping to generate interest and get landowner's to volunteer me access to their property. These properties would be more like backyards in a suburban landscape. In my proposal I suggested that working in people's backyards would allow me to do outreach and education. This outreach and would be basically house-to-house and one-on-one by necessity. This is the feedback on my broader impacts, they gave me a "fair" assessment.
"The broader impacts included are traditional modes of dissimination including journals and presentations."
This was the only comment this reviewer left for the broader impacts category. In my opinion you can't really beat the type of outreach where you are literally going house to house doing research in a person's backyard and using the opportunity to educate them on science that is taking place in their own backyard about the wildlife that lives in it. Projects such as the Smithsonian's Project Nest Watch and Cornell's Project Feeder Watch use similar methods and I drew from these citizen science programs. In addition to this outreach I also needed help collecting certain samples and suggested that landowner's would be important for collecting certain data. This made a portion of my proposal interactive with the community.
Here are my questions.
Do you think I am overreacting to this? I am looking to see if other people have had similar experiences. Is this just the game when you have over 16000 applicants?
While I can't appeal (even if I did, I don't think I got a good enough review from another reviewer) is there a way to provide feedback on a reviewer? I feel like my proposal wasn't given the thought and consideration deserved considering how much work was put in. I was hoping that maybe there is a process where if several applicants had similar experiences and gave feedback perhaps this reviewer would not be a reviewer for future applicants.
My lab mates and friends are on my side and trying to be supportive, but I want some outside opinions since they are obviously trying to be consoling and thus I am not sure if my issues are even valid. Thanks for any thoughts on the matter!
