The Czech ELIXIR Node organised the first Capacity Building Workshop, on 8-9 October 2015 in Brno, Czech Republic. The aim was to raise the awareness of the opportunities offered by EU Structural Funds to ELIXIR Nodes across Europe and offer practical insights into accessing the funds. Over 20 participants from across the ELIXIR network and beyond attended the workshop and shared their experiences in accessing and managing the funding.
The event was hosted by the Central European Institute for Technology (CEITEC), itself a successful example of using Structural Funds for research. The hosts - Jiří Vondrášek, the Head of ELIXIR Czech Republic, Jaroslav Koča, Chairman of ELIXIR CZ Board and CEITEC Director, and Ondřej Hradil, Senior Analyst and Project Manager at CEITEC - presented the Czech national Node and their experiences in developing and implementing Structural Funds projects. The programme also included discussions on synergies between different EU funds and developing business cases for projects. The workshop also set the stage for the ELIXIR Structural Funds taskforce, which will be fully formed during the coming months.
The full programme, all presentation slides and photo gallery are available on the CEITEC website.
About ELIXIR Capacity Building Programme
The EU Structural Funds workshop was part the ELIXIR-EXCELERATE Node Capacity Building programme. The programme's main focus is on knowledge transfer between ELIXIR’s larger and more established Nodes, and from them to newer or smaller ELIXIR Nodes in less research-intensive areas of the EU. The next two Capacity building workshop will take place in Uppsala, Sweden, on 19-20 October (Genome assembly and annotation) and in Brussels, Belgium, on 3-4 November (Structure and Governance of ELIXIR Nodes).