Champions are recruited by open call and selected with their line manager’s endorsement. Training runs as three connected stages.
A week-long, half-day, train-the-trainer programme covering the basics of research, anatomy of a competitive application, writing for review panels, budgeting, PPI, the Irish funding landscape, and how to mentor others.
A curated session where clinical and academic colleagues meet around shared research questions. Each table leaves with a defined question and a provisional team. Champions facilitate.
A hands-on grant writing workshop for the teams that formed at brokerage, co-delivered by the champions and the CRPO. Participants leave with an actionable project.
– roughly two to four hours a month, with release time agreed in writing by your line manager.
– peer guidance, signposting and mentoring. Champions do not co-author or write the applications they advise on.
– a named profile on the Cancer Centre website and in the Annual Report, and letters of recognition to support fellowship, career development and promotion applications.
– 60 to 90 minutes with the programme team, built around real cases the champions are supporting.
– informal access to senior UCD research expertise when a question goes beyond peer guidance.
– application templates, worked budgets, exemplar PPI plans and plain-English summaries.
The mentor panel is voluntary and light-touch: occasional conversations with a champion or an applicant, at a point where senior perspective makes the difference.
To become an academic mentor, please email crpo@ucd.ie
Staffed on rotation by the champions and led jointly by an Advanced Nurse Practitioner and a Senior HSCP. Scheduled 60-minute slots, with walk-in availability alongside pre-booked appointments.
The train-the-trainer week is funded by a Fulbright Alumni Project Fund award, which brings Dr Margaret Barton-Burke, Director of Nursing Research at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, to Ireland to deliver the training to the champion cohort.