CIHR Operating Grants

Operating Grants support research by individuals and teams. 

CIHR Operating grants range from $100k to over $1 million with terms of 12 months to multiple years. Each Operating competition focuses on a different research area.

See Operating Grant Opportunities in ResearchNet

Application Process

All CIHR Operating Grant competitions use the PI submission process (note: this is different from the Institutional E-approval process used for CIHR Project Grant competitions).

Be sure to confirm the ORS deadlines and procedures relevant to your campus, as well as to your Faculty and/or Department/School, as necessary:

UBC Vancouver | UBC Okanagan

Support and Resources

SPARC supports UBC faculty-led CIHR Operating Grant applications with consultations, resources and sample grants, and grant reviews. We encourage UBC faculty researchers – especially new-to-UBC faculty – to get in touch early to optimize the benefit of our services. 

SPARC provides 1 review per application. To optimize the benefits of grant review, please submit a well-developed draft. Reviews typically require ~2 business days; however total turn-around time may be longer, depending on the queue.

1. Relevance Review: suggestions to directly align applicable documents (e.g., the Summary of Research Proposal and Relevance Form) with the chosen research area and funding call objectives (note: applications not deemed relevant to the funding call and chosen research area will be withdrawn by CIHR from the competition prior to peer review).
2. Editorial Review: detailed edits and suggestions focused on content clarity and impact, flow and readability and organization/structure, and correct spelling, grammar and punctuation (note: SPARC does not edit references, verify budgets, or edit or format CVs).
3. Criteria Review: suggestions to ensure adherence to evaluation criteria and instructions, including formatting guidelines.

With sufficient capacity, SPARC will conduct a combined editorial and criteria review. During periods of high demand, SPARC may focus on relevance or criteria reviews to ensure that all NPAs requesting support receive feedback. All reviews are completed by the Friday prior to the agency deadline, to ensure applicants have time to consider SPARC’s feedback before finalizing their grant for submission. Please note that SPARC does not provide grant writing or manuscript review services.

Notes:

• SPARC support for CIHR Project Grant takes priority, which means that our Team & Large Network Grant support is placed on hold twice per year, from mid-January to the end of February and from mid-July to mid-September. 
• If the PI has access to local support (e.g., UBC Okanagan’s Office of Research Services Research Facilitation, BCCHR's Research and Technology Development Office, Faculty-based Grant Facilitator) for grant reviews, they should pick one provider to work with so that we can collectively support as many UBC researchers as possible.
• For joint calls or calls with partner agencies where the application submission and peer review processes are managed by other agencies, SPARC support may be limited.

Contacts