The NDC Financing Fellowship Programme (hereinafter referred to as “NDC-FFP” or “the Programme”) supports and trains 50 exceptional individuals who are interested in further enhancing their knowledge and skills on NDC finance - i.e. the identification of key financial, human and technical resources to develop innovative NDC programmes and projects; analytical capabilities at the national level and the development of knowledge products, tools, and institutional innovations to address these issues. The Programme is divided into two tracks focussing on fellows from the policy sector and from the research sector respectively (hereinafter referred to as “policy track” and “research track”).
Through the fellowship programme, technical understanding is created and exchanged related to a topic of high relevance to the sustainable (economic) growth of many countries. By following a bilingual approach, fellowships will be awarded to Anglophone as well as Francophone candidates from Sub-Sahara Africa (applications from Lusophone candidates are also welcomed).
The Programme is funded by the International Development Research Centre (hereinafter referred to as “IDRC”) and implemented by the Frankfurt School of Finance & Management (hereinafter referred to as “Frankfurt School”) and the African Research Impact Network (hereinafter referred to as “ARIN”).
More information on NDC-FFP can be found on the official website: https://www.frankfurt-school.de/idrc/ndcffp
NDC-FFP Set-up
Phase 1: The NDC-FFP will provide up to 50 full scholarships for the participation at the six-months e-learning certification course on NDC Financing, the Certified Expert in Financing NDCs (CEFNDC).
Phase 2: The best 20 performing fellows will qualify for the following classroom trainings and a online seminar series. One researcher per cohort qualifies for a 2-month internship at Frankfurt School of Finance and Management (Frankfurt, Germany) or the African Research Impact Network (Nairobi, Kenya).
Fellowship holders will receive the following benefits from the Programme (subject to change):
Fellowship holders are encouraged to fulfil the following duties:
Policy fellows
Research fellows
The NDC-FFP will and cannot accommodate spouses, children or friends during on-site events.
Applications for the NDC Financing Fellowship Programme (NDC-FFP) have to be submitted via an online application system that can be accessed on the NDC-FFP website https://www.frankfurt-school.de/idrc/ndcffp. All information requested must be written in English and all mandatory questions have to be answered. Only complete applications will be accepted (please have a look at the application instructions that are available on the website).
Submission deadline for the applications is 31st July 2020, 11:59 pm (CET).
General eligibility criteria:
NDC-FFP supports, promotes and trains exceptional citizen or individuals working from Sub-Saharan Africa (applications from English- or French-speaking Lusophone candidates are also welcomed) from research and policy. For the first cohort, applicants should be proficient in English (both written and oral); showing strong motivation and commitment to take over responsibility and to stay with the programme.
Specific eligibility criteria:
Research Track: For the research track, the NDC-FFP invites (early career) researchers in universities, research centres, and action-research NGO's from Sub-Saharan African countries to apply for the programme and to work on a research project to NDC financing. To be eligible, the research fellow must meet all of the following requirements:
Poliy Track: The policy track is targeted to young and mid-career professionals primarily from the public sector who have around 5 years of work experience relevant for climate change and finance. Preferable, fellows should be at the forefront of NDC, climate mitigation and/or adaptation finance or climate policy implementation issues in their countries. To be eligible as a policy fellow, you must fulfil the following requirements:
NDC-FFP staff will pre-screen all applications to ensure that eligibility criteria are met. Incomplete applications or applications that do not meet all eligibility criteria will receive a notification and will not be considered in the further evaluation process.
An independent selection committee will review eligible applications and will select the candidates for the fellowship programme. Candidates might be interviewed via Skype or phone by a member of the selection committee.
All applicants will be notified upon their selection status in August 2020. Fellows who are accepted must send their confirmation (or rejection) of fellowship participation (Phase 1) within 7 days of receipt of the notification. If a candidate does not accept the fellowship or does not answer within 7 days, the first candidate on the waiting list will be offered the fellowship instead.
Accepted fellows for Phase 2 will be asked to sign a contract outlining the conditions of the Fellowship. The awarding of the Fellowship becomes factual through the signing of the fellowship contract. The contract has to be signed and sent back to by the fellowship candidate within 14 days after reception of the contract.
All fellows must attend all on-site as well as online events over the 12 months (Phase 2). Failure to attend one on-site event without notice as well as any behaviour that could bring discredit to the NDC-FFP is grounds for immediate dismissal and removal from the programme.
A fellowship holder who does not attain the objectives set in the approved work programme, or whose fellowship is cancelled due to serious violation of his/her duties, for reasons ascribable to him/her, might be forced to refund the total or part of the values already received, according to the circumstances of each case.
Please note that if a Fellow fails to comply with any one of the above-mentioned terms and conditions of the NDC-FFP Fellowship Programme, Frankfurt School and ARIN reserve the right to determine the appropriate course of action, including, but not limited to: (i) terminating the Fellowship before the end of the contract period; (ii) causing the Fellow's early departure from the program; (iii) and/or asking the Fellow to cover costs for incurred costs.
Each fellowship holder may not be the beneficiary of any other concurrent fellowship funding the same purpose, except when expressly agreed between the funding entities (Phase 2).
The fellowship holder is under the obligation to inform the funding entity about awards of any other fellowship or grant.
Transportation to on-site events has to be financed in advance by the fellows and will be reimbursed against receipt up to a fixed limit. The limit will be announced to the fellows before the respective on-site event takes place and is calculated based on current ticket prices. For the research internship, the Programme will cover travel, accommodation and board (no renumeration will be paid).
The selected fellows will have to submit the following deliverables:
Policy Fellows:
Research Fellows:
In order follow all NDC-FFP components smoothly, applicants should guarantee the following technical requirements:
Having access to a stable internet connection, enabling downloads of PDF files and other files with a size up to 5 MB, solving online tests and online assignments, opening forums, streaming videos and audio lectures.
The online platform works best with Internet Explorer 10.0+, Mozilla Firefox 31.0+, Google Chrome 42.0+ or Apple Safari 7.0+
The following browser settings have to be made: activate JavaScript, allow pop-up-windows (for http://linked.frankfurt-school.de), activate Java, approve Cookies
Having a PDF-reader, for example the Adobe Reader, which can be download for free at www.adobe.com as well as office software to be able to open MS-Word (.doc & .docx) and MS-Excel files (.xls & .xlsx). If you don't possess Microsoft Office you can download the free Open Office (www.openoffice.org/).
To be able to follow our video lectures a broad band internet access is required as well as a minimum of 1GHz CPU. Furthermore, you need to have the flash player installed, which is available for free at www.adobe.com.
Frankfurt School will have access to all information related to the applications submitted for this fellowship, including the full applications, and the ranking and rating lists. Individual applications are otherwise considered strictly confidential and will be used for internal review and communication purposes only. Applications from rejected participants will be deleted immediately.
By way of applying to this call, the applicant consents to the disclosure of the documents submitted by the applicant to the reviewers involved in the selection process. The applicant further consents to the disclosure of the name of the applicant, and the title of the proposed project (for research track only) in any announcement of selected proposals. References are also submitted in complete confidence. Further information about GDRP compliance of Frankfurt School is available on our website: https://www.frankfurt-school.de/en/home/data-protection