CaSDaR Reviewer Guidelines

If you are interested in becoming a reviewer, please read our guidance below to understand our process, timelines and reviewer requirements, and fill in our reviewer volunteer form. This information is also downloadable via our Reviewer Guidelines Document.

Recruited reviewers will be sent reviewer forms with accompanying instructions of how to fill them in.  

Key Dates

  • 15/11/25: Registration of interest forms received
  • 21/01/25: Applications received by CaSDaR
  • 28/01/25: Applications sent to reviewers
  • 28/02/25: Applications returned to CaSDaR by reviewers
  • Week beginning 02/03/25: Review panel (CaSDaR leadership team + reviewers) meet for 3 hours to finalise awards (precise date TBC and based upon reviewer availability)
  • 11/03/25: Successful projects announced

Application Details

We are asking reviewers to assess applications for grants of £5k, for short-term projects of 8-10 weeks, and £70k, for longer projects of 6-9 months. 

  1. Applications for £5k funding –These are aimed at giving individuals an opportunity to upskill and experience data stewardship work. Individuals will be part of a training cohort and will be expected to maintain regular contact with that cohort throughout the duration of the 8-10 week project. We expect that this application form will be relatively lightweight and each application form will not be more than 5 pages/2000 words, so should not take longer than 1 hour per application form to review. More information can be found on our CaSDaR £5K Mini Projects Page. 
  2. Applications for £70k funding –These are aimed at providing use cases and an evidence base to show the value of embedding data stewardship into a project, therefore we anticipate that these projects will be more complex and will last 6-9 months. Applicants for this funding will be expected to work independently, and training will not be provided. We expect that each application will not be more than 8 pages/2800 words, therefore each should take approximately 2 hours per application form to review. More information can be found on our CaSDaR £70K Large Projects Page. 

The primary applicants for both schemes must be individuals employed at an organisation based in the UK (or the UK office of a multinational corporation) proposing to host this project. Organisations that are not normally eligible for UKRI funding may be considered for support through this flexible funding call. However, any funding awarded must comply with UKRI’s subsidy control regulations. Addressing this will not be the focus of the review process, and due diligence will be handled by the CaSDaR team.

Review Process

  • Applications will be screened to remove incomplete or insufficient applications; in these instances, the network coordinator will provide a follow up conversation with those individuals.
  • Applications will then be allocated randomly to reviewers. Projected 5 applications per reviewer for the £5k projects and 3 applications per reviewer for the £70k projects.
  • Reviewers will receive links to the relevant reviewer forms, and instructions on how to complete them.
  • For the £5k projects, each application will be reviewed twice and for the £70k projects each application will be reviewed three times 
  • Once the reviews have been received, the scores for the applications will be ranked. 
  • The outcomes will be discussed in the review panel.

Review Criteria

  • Reviews will be judged by reviewers on a 1-5 scale on the categories listed below.
  • We ask the reviewers to focus on the following criteria for review for both the £70k projects and the £5k projects: 
    • The feasibility of the project: whether the outcomes are realistic within the given timeframe and budget
    • The degree to which the application addresses and explains the challenges that affect data stewardship in their area of work and how this relates to the objectives of CaSDaR
    • The degree to which the project proposal convincingly explains the impact of the project on the individual (for the £5k project) and for the local or national setting (for the £70k project)
    • The degree to which the project will advance an area that is currently underrepresented in data stewardship
    • The suitability of the organisational infrastructure and expertise available to support the project
  • For the £70k projects, we also ask that in addition the reviewers consider the following:
    • The degree to which the project outlines how the impact of the project will be sustained beyond the funding period.
    • The degree to which the application represents a timely intervention for the area of work

There will also be an opportunity to provide feedback to the applicants.

We are interested in ensuring that areas/projects and organisations that are under-represented are considered, however this will be addressed with the reviewer panel.