CIHR DRA 2013 Competition

[torontotron]

That's so kind of you guys! This will be my third CIHR result, 2nd cycle (Vanier + CIHR rejection last year), despite having pretty good rankings, I seem to always just miss the cut off. 

It's easy to take it personally, I even went last year to many workshops hosted by my school which evaluate your application pre-submission (evaluations by profs who actually ARE ON the CIHR review panels), they told me my application was fantastic, and still it was rejected. 

 

But, you've got to make some internal justification for the fact that although it is a structured multi-tier process of review, you really have no control over who reads and ranks your applications. You could catch someone on a bad day and they could rank you poorly. You could get unlucky and have reviewers who actually don't understand or see the merit of your project, where all others would (this happens in peer review publishing aaaalllll the time). Worse, you could get someone who hates your PI for personal reasons (entirely entirely possible) and will rank you low - I think this especially happens in close competitive fields such as my own (neural stem cell biology).

And, at the end of it all, the fact that it relies on artificially constructed numbered categories in order to administer the award, and not narrowing down processes and discussions (ie for the PI's operating grants there are actually reviewers sitting in a room face to face discussing each individual proposal, but in the end it still is a number) I think ends up really hurting fantastic applications and can put way too much emphasis on one weak point in an otherwise excellent package. 

 

Anyway, this is just me psyching myself up for more rejection. Good luck everyone!!

[PhD to go]

I am going through cycles of optimism and pessimism. But the reasons torontotron mentioned are overwhelmingly true. The results will be out in 24 hours and they are beyond us now. We have worked hard for the award and hopefully it pays off.

[depressedphdstudent]

i hate this wait, i spent a long time on this app and am feeling more and more pessimist as time goes on.......

 

how do you guys cope with rejection? i think i have a very thin skin. I applied to the CIHR travel award and one wrote a lengthy review saying it was excellent but the other reviewer wrote 2 lines and said it was moderate.... hope that doesn't happen again

[echob]

I've convinced myself that CIHR doesn't really fund my type of research, based on previous projects awarded a DRA...so that's how I'll cope with rejection if needed.

Edited April 15, 2013 by echob

[PhD to go]

It will take me some time to cope with rejection. The best is to try and channel the disappointment to building up a stronger application for next year. I hope that if my application gets rejected, I would at least get constructive feedback. Not much to ask. It will definitely diminish the harsh impact of disapproval. 

[Mike Slackenerny]

All very good points. Also would like to point out that for some of us, this is our last chance to qualify for a DRA. Our CIHR biological clock is literally ticking

[Mike Slackenerny]

I had been waiting for today since Oct 15th, when the CIHR applications were due. I would have given anything to see the results earlier. Oddly enough, exactly 6 months later, there's a part of me that doesn't really want to know the decision. It occurred to me just after 12am on the 15th - perhaps its the calm before the storm, but all of a sudden I'm not really dying to find out.

Edit: I meant to say that I had been waiting since April 16, 2012 (When I got rejected the first time around last year... I couldn't wait to reapply and find out right away)

Edited April 15, 2013 by Mike Slackenerny

[depressedphdstudent]

that's good mike

 

how many times have you applied? i thought you could only apply twice

[Mike Slackenerny]

Yep you can only apply twice if you're a PhD student like me who had a MSc. from before. The first time was in 2012, and this is my second (and last) shot at it.

[PhD to go]

Morning. I hope it will be a good one for us all

[Mike Slackenerny]

[MissionRNAi]

[Mike Slackenerny]

prep the alcohol either way

[PhD to go]

and a box of tissues?

 

Where are the resutls posted on ResearchNet?

[Mike Slackenerny]

On the front page. as soon as you log in. you'll see it listed under "Current activities". After clicking on it, scroll down to "View Decision" - in the new page you can see 6 files - I highly recommend scrolling to the bottom of the page and viewing all files combined together (so you don't have to click on 6 individual files) - you'll have the front page with the stats, the decision letter, reviewer 1 scores, reviewer 1 comments, reviewer 2 scores and reviewer 2 comments.

Seems a little odd to say all this, since you'll all find out soon enough

[MissionRNAi]

70,000 crispers.....70,000 wheat thins....70,000 oreos...

[Mike Slackenerny]

Mondays are sucky days for me. I'm going to have to step away from my computer for some time and may not be there to check the results immediately. I'll try and check in whenever I can, but I'll definitely catch up later in the afternoon/evening.

May the relative force be with all of you.

[PhD to go]

Thanks Mike!

[MissionRNAi]

2 more hours?

[PhD to go]

This is torturous. I can't help but keep refreshing my email and ResearchNet...

[MissionRNAi]

I am expecting "we could not see your/your supervisor's CVs because they were made using the new CCV" statement and thus flat out rejection

Edited April 15, 2013 by MissionRNAi

[echob]

Lol does that actually happen?

[MissionRNAi]

I don't know, new CCV thing is new and probably buggy

[echob]

One would hope that if there was something wrong with your application or something missing they would tell you right away. How shitty would that be to just find out today

[MissionRNAi]

seriously

 

 

aaaaaaaah JUST TELL US ALREADY