{"id":1919,"date":"2025-02-27T15:58:04","date_gmt":"2025-02-27T14:58:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/internationalblog.unibe.ch\/?p=1919"},"modified":"2025-10-28T11:09:43","modified_gmt":"2025-10-28T10:09:43","slug":"existential-funding-crisis-averted","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/internationalblog.unibe.ch\/?p=1919","title":{"rendered":"Existential funding crisis averted"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Swiss Government Excellence Scholarships narrowly escape drastic funding cuts<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Image: Sebastian Leidel<\/sup><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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The Swiss Parliament was all but set on cutting half of the funding for the Swiss Government Excellence Scholarships (ESKAS). This funding programme supports researchers from all over the world to pursue doctoral or postdoctoral research in Switzerland. Sebastian Leidel, Professor at the Department of Chemistry, Biochemistry and Pharmaceutical Sciences and ESKAS delegate for the University of Bern, explains how these cuts threatened the survival of the scholarship programme and why it deserves to survive.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Professor Leidel, the Swiss Government Excellence Scholarships recently caused a lot of controversy in parliament?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was characteristic for this debate that the word \u201cexcellence\u201d was dropped in parliament. The item on the agenda was \u201cScholarships for foreign students in Switzerland\u201d. However, this term is not correct and shows a lack of understanding for how the selection of the successful candidates for ESKAS works. These are PhDs and post doctoral researchers who make important contributions to scientific research in Switzerland \u2013 research excellence is what it\u2019s all about in this scholarship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The successful scholarship holders achieve a high research output at a relatively low cost. In that sense this is probably the most efficient scholarship programme I know. Therefore, even small budget changes have big effects on the scholarship holders. In fact, the funding has never been increased in the last 30 years, which means a big cut in real terms (i.e. after inflation).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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“The scholarship is extremely competitive”
Sebastian Leidel<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

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The scholarship is extremely competitive. For each application round I personally review on average 50 research projects and out of these one to maybe four candidates are selected. We are talking about a success rate of 5-10% here. It always is a really difficult choice! I look at some of these applications and say to myself: wow \u2013 these are such impressive CVs!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What would these funding cuts have meant for grantees of the scholarship?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The original plan was to cut the budget of the Swiss Government Excellence Scholarships by CHF 4.8 million, which is roughly 50% of the entire scholarship programme. This would have meant that by May or June we would have had to send everyone home because the money would have been used up. Since this academic year began in autumn 2024, the budget for 2025 is already fully committed. For some scholarship holders these cuts would have come just months before the completion of their PhD.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The ESKAS commission also does the selection for bilateral research funding programmes, such as Fulbright in the USA. These are Fulbright scholars who want to come to Switzerland and for the time they are here they are part of the Swiss Government Excellence Scholarship programme. In return, Swiss researchers receive funding from agencies abroad in a reciprocal system. In such cases, we would have broken our contracts with research funding agencies in partner countries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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