ARCHIVED – CIHR Open Operating Grant Program Competitions - Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) – 2011

WarningThis page has been archived. Please visit the CIHR Open Operating Grant Program Competitions - Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) for current information.

Archived Content

Information identified as archived on the Web is for reference, research or recordkeeping purposes. It has not been altered or updated after the date of archiving. Web pages that are archived on the Web are not subject to the Government of Canada Web Standards. As per the Communications Policy of the Government of Canada, you can request alternate formats by contacting us.

(2011-06-30) We hope that you will find this document useful and informative. This set of FAQs continue to develop as new questions are posed and answers documented.

CIHR would like to take this opportunity to thank the research community for its ongoing feedback on important funding-related issues. We invite you to continue to send us your questions and comments at Research.News@cihr.gc.ca.

Figures - Open Operating Grant Program

Application and Funding Statistics OOGP and Related Programs
Application and Funding Statistics OOGP and Related Programs (Graph including only Fundable Applications)

Q1. How does CIHR arrive at the overall success rate statistics for the OOGP program?

A. The success rate statistics given in OOGP funding results include:

  • all of the applications submitted to the OOGP competition that were funded from the OOGP core competition budget; AND
  • all of the applications submitted to the same competition which were funded fully or in part through Priority Announcements or other sources.*

* Priority Announcements represent additional sources of funding beyond the core OOGP competition budget that are available for funding of highly ranked applications that meet specific relevance criteria defined by CIHR's Priority Announcement partners.

In the Funding Decisions Notification for the Open Operating Grant Program competitions, CIHR provides information with respect to funding through the core OOGP budget and funding through other budget sources for the competition. This includes reporting on:

  • total number of applications in the competition;
  • total number of fundable applications (rated >=3.5);
  • total number of grants funded from the core competition budget and estimated multi-year investment;
  • estimated number of additional full term grants funded through priority announcements and estimated multi-year investment;
  • estimated number of additional bridge grants funded through priority announcements and other sources and estimated one-time investment;
  • total number of grants approved within the given competition;
  • average full term grant size;
  • median full term grant size,
  • average duration of full term grants .

Q2. Why does CIHR include bridge grants in its competition reporting?

A. CIHR includes all grants funded within the competition as part of its competition statistics to be comprehensive on reporting all public dollars invested through that competition. Bridge grants provide funding to investigators that enable them to apply to subsequent OOGP competitions while launching or maintaining the momentum of their research and strengthening their applications for future competitions.

Q3. Why does CIHR award bridge grants?

A. CIHR would like to be able to award full-term grants to all the highly ranked applications in the competition. However, doing so would exceed the budget for the program and would "mortgage" future competitions by tying up funds awarded to the (on average) 4 year grants thus restricting our ability to fund new grants in future competitions. The one-year bridge grants are a mechanism to maximize what we can invest in the current year's competition; that help researchers sustain their research and try again in a future competition; and that do not unduly restrict our ability to fund new grants in future competitions.

Q4. How did CIHR arrive at the target of 400-450 grants to be funded from the OOGP competition?

A. There were two main lines of analysis that led to the target of at least 400 (400-450) grants per competition. On the one hand, looking at historical statistics we had funded between 800 and 900 grants per year and wanted, at minimum, to sustain at least that level of support in terms of numbers of grants. CIHR views a target as a minimum number of grants we aim to fund- not a maximum. Second we did multiple financial analyses and scenarios based on variables such as a planned level of program budget each year, the projected duration of grants, and the projected value of grants (applications have increased in both duration and requested dollars since 2006-07). Financial scenarios which took into account these variables as well as the goal to leave enough unspent budget in future years for each new competition led us to the target as a realistic and sustainable one that CIHR could responsibly commit to over a number of years.

Q5. Is the increase in the number of applications submitted to CIHR in 2010-2011 due to an influx of applications from health researchers previously supported by SSHRC?

A. The number of funding applications that CIHR receives on an annual basis continues to grow. In fact, since 2005-06, the number of applications has increased by 31 per cent. We track the areas where we see growth in number of applications. There has been an increase in the number of applications related to social sciences but in recent competitions there has also been an increase in the number of applications for projects pertaining to cancer, neurosciences as well as health services and policy research.

Q6. Will CIHR guarantee a minimum success rate?

A. CIHR is moving away from the use of success rates as a barometer for the Open Operating Grant Program. Given factors such as available program budget, increasing size and duration of applications requests and increasing application pressure CIHR is not in a position to make such guarantees. However, in February 2008, CIHR pledged to create and maintain a stable Open Operating Grant Program. This included a commitment to fund at least 400 grants per competition. If we look at all the grants funded within each competition we have been able to keep this commitment for all competitions since and plan to continue to do so in the future.

We recognize that the limitation in CIHR's capacity to fund additional numbers of grants through the OOGP contributes to a highly competitive funding environment which brings with it opportunity losses, applicant fatigue, reviewer fatigue and funding challenges for many researchers. In committing to fund at least 400 grants per competition CIHR is acting, within its capacity, to bring stability to this program.

Q7. Why do some success rates for past competitions appear to fall below the 23% quoted in the ARCHIVED - E-Alert message from the Scientific Council of CIHR, based on data available on the CIHR website? See, for example, the funding decisions notifications for the March 2010 OOGP competition, the September 2009 OOGP competition and the March 2009 OOGP competition.

A. The statistics reported at the time of OOGP funding decision are the ones available at that time. Additional full term grants and bridge grants, particularly those funded by partners, are frequently unconfirmed when we post our results, and are therefore not included in our totals at that time. The graph included with the E-Alert message provides the total number of grants funded through these past competitions.

In the Funding Decisions Notification for the Open Operating Grant Program competitions, CIHR provides information with respect to funding through the core OOGP budget and funding through other budget sources for the competition. This includes reporting on:

  • total number of applications in the competition;
  • total number of fundable applications (rated >=3.5);
  • total number of grants funded from the core competition budget and estimated multi-year investment;
  • estimated number of additional full term grants funded through priority announcements and estimated multi-year investment;
  • estimated number of additional bridge grants funded through priority announcements and other sources and estimated one-time investment;
  • total number of grants approved within the given competition;
  • average full term grant size;
  • median full term grant size,
  • average duration of full term grants .

Q8. Why is the computed success rate statistic higher than the cutoff in the OOGP committees?

A. The cutoff for funding of full term grants out of the core budget of the open competition for the last two competitions was approximately 17%. The overall computed success rate for the competition includes all grants funded out of the competition from all sources of funding - the open competition budget, through priority announcements and other funding sources.

For an explanation of how funding is determined for the Open Operating Grant Program competitions and the linked priority announcement grants see Question 11.

Q9. Will CIHR put more money into the OOG Program?

A. Every year, CIHR carefully reviews its budget and allocates money across its programs to maximize impact and deliver according to all aspects of our mandate. The OOG Program is one of CIHR's cornerstone programs and we intend to keep our commitment to create and maintain a stable Open Operating Grant Program - i.e. a commitment to fund at least 400 grants per competition.

Q10. How were RCTs treated in the March 2011 OOGP competition?

A. The March 2011 competition cycle represented the fourth competition since CIHR integrated applications for randomized controlled trial (RCT) grants into the general competition. This was done in response to a clear need expressed by the RCT community. Combining the RCT and Open Operating Grants funding opportunities into a single competition results in a more stable, sustainable and fully integrated process and further supports the goals outlined in CIHR's five-year strategic plan, Health Research Roadmap: Creating innovative research for better health and health care.

In the March 2011 competition, we received an increased number of RCT applications. We received 177 applications in the March 2011 competition, 155 applications in the September 2010 competition, 167 applications in the March 2010 competition, and 149 applications in the September 2009 competition. [Note regarding data: the number of applications for the March 2011 and September 2010 competitions include those applications identified as RCTs according to a specific CIHR definition of RCT, whereas the reported numbers of applications for the March 2010 and September 2009 competitions include those applications self-identified as RCTs by the applicants.]

The total of 33 RCT grants funded through the March 2011 competition compares well to funding in past competitions: September 2010 (28 trials funded); March 2010 (27 trials funded); September 2009 (10 trials funded); February 2009 (11 trials funded) and September 2008 (13 trials funded).

Q11. How is funding determined for the Open Operating Grant Program competitions and the linked priority announcement grants?

A. Core Open Operating Grant Program (OOGP) competition budget

For each competition of the Open Operating Grant Program, a core budget is allocated. Once all OOGP peer review committee meetings are complete for the competition and CIHR has in hand both the committee rankings and the application budgets as adjusted through peer review, CIHR staff calculate how many grants can be funded within the allocated core OOGP competition budget.

The overall sequence of funding priority as dictated by peer-review results for all applications in the competition (the overall ranking list) is determined by calculating the percent ranking for each application (i.e. the within-committee rank placement divided by the number of applications in the committee, multiplied by 100), and then combining the percent rankings for all applications into a single overall list. Applications are funded, in rank order, until the available funding is exhausted. This calculation takes into consideration ties in percent ranking across the full set of OOGP committees (i.e. applications with tied percent ranking are either all funded or none of these are funded). An across-the-board reduction to the budgets recommended by peer review is included in the calculation to permit funding of a larger number of grants from the core budget. The across-the-board cut has ranged from 11% to 19.5% over the past 5 years.

The percent ranking cut-off for grants funded out of the core OOGP budget allocation for the latest competition (March 2011 intake) was 18.33%. All grants with a percent rank of 18.33% or better were funded from the core OOGP competition budget unless they were deemed a large grant. Large grants were ranked together and the top 3 funded through a separate "large grant" funding envelope.

Priority Announcements - additional sources of funding for each competition

Priority Announcements represent additional sources of funding beyond the core OOGP competition budget that are available for funding of highly ranked applications that meet specific relevance criteria defined by CIHR's priority announcement partners. In applying for the OOGP competition, applicants can identify up to three priority announcements to which their application may be relevant. In addition, some Institutes will automatically consider an application for funding from their Institute budget based on the selection of that Institute as a primary and/or secondary Institute for that application. These additional opportunities are also published as priority announcements for each competition but do not require any additional steps during the application process to be considered eligible.

Once funding through the Core OOGP competition budget is determined, additional funding through individual priority announcement budgets is applied as follows:

  1. Full-term funding: All applications deemed eligible and relevant to published Priority Announcements for full term grants are funded in rank order from the assigned priority announcement budget envelope.
  2. Bridge funding: All applications deemed eligible and relevant to published Priority Announcements for bridge or partial term grants are funded in rank order from the assigned priority announcement budget envelope.
  3. Additional "generic" bridge funding: Should funds become available within the overall CIHR budget due to less than planned investment in other funding programs (funds that must be invested within the fiscal year by CIHR or must otherwise be returned to the central government), additional bridge grants may be allocated to the remaining unfunded applications, in rank order, beginning with the highest ranked application in the overall list that is still unfunded until the budget assigned has been exhausted. The amount of funding for this type of bridge grant for a given competition is not predictable as it is based on outcomes of other CIHR competitions.

The percent rank of the first unfunded application will differ from one committee to another once the priority announcements have been applied as applications in those committees may have been relevant to one or more priority announcements. In total, for the latest competition (March 2011 intake), approximately 60 additional applications will be funded through additional sources of funding beyond the core OOGP competition budget. As a result, the total number of funded grants will be 461 of 2,298. While this number can be interpreted as an overall success rate for the competition of about 20%% this does not indicate that all grants with a percent ranking of 20% or better were funded or that no grants with a percent ranking of less then 20% were funded. A combination of both overall rank order and eligibility/relevance to the published priority announcement criteria determines the next application on the overall ranking list that is funded through the priority announcement process.

Reporting of results

In providing the results for a given OOGP competition, CIHR reports on:

  • total number of applications in the competition;
  • total number of fundable applications (rated >=3.5);
  • total number of grants funded from the core competition budget and estimated multi-year investment;
  • estimated number of additional full term grants funded through priority announcements and estimated multi-year investment;
  • estimated number of additional bridge grants funded through priority announcements and other sources and estimated one-time investment;
  • total number of grants approved within the given competition;
  • average full term grant size;
  • median full term grant size,
  • average duration of full term grants.

Q12. Why did CIHR create a large grant envelope within the OOGP budget?

A: As first announced in the Funding Opportunity for 2010-2011 and the e-alert announcing the results of the September 2010 competition, a specific part of the OOGP budget has been reserved for large grants. A large grant is defined as being within the top 2% of grant value (post peer review recommendations).

CIHR created this separate envelope of funds in order to manage budgetary risk, given that:

  • the program does not have a maximum dollar amount imposed on applications;
  • the application pressure and thus pressure on the CIHR overall budget is high and continues to grow;
  • the average size and duration of grant applications is increasing; and
  • and there is a commitment to fund at least 400 grants per competition.

Q13. How are committee peer review rankings used to determine which large grants are funded?

A:  The process involves first determining, based on average annual grant size, the number of applications that are to be considered as "large grants" in the competition.  Various scenarios are run on the post peer review competition data (percentile ranking, peer review recommended budgets) with a view to maximizing the number of grants that can be funded both within the $12.5M large grant envelope and within the rest of the competition, while keeping in mind the CIHR commitment to fund at least 400 grants overall.  These scenarios are used to determine whether the designation as a large grant for the competition will include for example all applications falling within the top 2% of average annual grant size or be limited to the top 1%, or the top 0.5%. In comparing scenarios, the outcome that maximizes the number of grants that can be funded both within the $12.5M large grants envelope and within the core OOGP competition budget is the preferred option. During the March 2011 competition, the second time we have implemented the large grant funding process, the top 0.5% of applications in terms of average annual grant size were considered as large grants.  Twelve grants met this criterion.  Having been peer reviewed within their original committee, the committee ratings for the twelve grants were converted to percent ranks relative to other grants in the committee, subsequently these were combined into a single percent rank list for funding, in rank order, from the large grants envelope  until those funds were depleted.

This process results in the possibility that there will be large grants that were ranked above the percent rank cutoff for funding from the core OOGP budget within their committee but may still fall below the percent rank funding cutoff for the large grants envelope . For the March 2011 competition 2 large grant applications were impacted in this way.

Q14. How is the multi-year $12.5M envelope applied?

A: A multi-year funding envelope implies that the full value of the forward commitment, over the course of the grants funded, must fall within the funds available. The simplest means of explanation is to provide an example. In this example the first 3 grants are fundable from within the 12.5M envelope. The fourth grant falls below the funding cutoff.

  Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year 4 Year 5 Total grant value Cumulative total cost
Rank #1 $1.1M $1.3M $1.1M $1.5M   0 $5.0M $5.0M
Rank #2 $0.7M $0.7M $0.7M $0.7M $0.7M $3.5M $8.5M
Rank #3 $0.5M $1.0M $1.0M $1.0M $0.5M $4.0M $12.5M
Rank #4 $2.0M $2.0M $1.0M $0 $0 $5.0M $17.5M

Q15. How does the application pressure compare to previous competitions?

A. Through the March 2011 OOGP competition we reviewed a total of 2,298 applications (withdrawals are excluded) compared to: 2,338 for September 2010, 2,230 for the March 2010 competition and 2,186 applications in the Fall 2009 competition.

Q16. How do you intend to communicate with us on these important funding-related issues?

A. We are engaging the University Delegates in further discussions on these matters. They will not only provide feedback on these discussions to their Institutions and the research community but can also forward your views to CIHR.

CIHR Funding News, also commonly referred to as CIHR's E-Alert, will be another means of communication with the research community. We encourage those of you who do not already receive this electronic newsletter to subscribe by visiting the CIHR website. Click on the Useful Link titled "Subscribe to CIHR's News for Researchers" which is located on the right-hand side of the web page. This will open a pop-up subscription form which you or your colleagues can complete. Click the "Submit" button. You will then see a pop-up message thanking you for your subscription. There is no charge for this subscription.

In addition, CIHR regularly provides updates to the community through messages on our website, and through other means such as visits to institutions.

Figures - Open Operating Grant Program

1. Application and Funding Statistics OOGP and Related Programs

1. Application and Funding Statistics OOGP and Related Programs

Figure 1 long description

- Additional full-term grants: Applications to the OOGP that are funded from other program budgets beyond the core competition budget,
e.g. Institutes and external partners; usually financing the full peer review recommended term and amount.

- Bridge grants: Applications to the OOGP that are provided with up to one year of funding from other program budgets beyond the core competition budget.

2. Application and Funding Statistics OOGP and Related Programs (Graph including only Fundable Applications - i.e., applications rated 3.5 or above)

2. Application and Funding Statistics OOGP and Related Programs (Graph including only Fundable Applications - i.e., applications rated 3.5 or above)

Figure 2 long description

- Additional full-term grants: Applications to the OOGP that are funded from other program budgets beyond the core competition budget,
e.g. Institutes and external partners; usually financing the full peer review recommended term and amount.

- Bridge grants: Applications to the OOGP that are provided with up to one year of funding from other program budgets beyond the core competition budget.