Research News & Funding Opportunities

  1. FoE ARC Discovery Project Expression of Interest Workshop – 6 November
  2. Congratulations to Dr Chelsea Hyde for being awarded a UoM 2025 Civic and Community Impact Fund
  3. Congratulations to Dr Hugh Gundlach for being awarded funding from the Collier Charitable Fund
  4. Congratulations to Professor Melitta Hogarth and her team on receiving the 2025 Distinguished Australian First Nations Creative Leadership Award from the Deans and Directors of Creative Arts (DDCA).
  5. NDRP Commissioned Research Project – closes 21 November
  6. Vic Health Impact Research Grant – closes 15 December

1. FoE ARC Discovery Project Expression of Interest Workshop – 6 November

Audience: Researchers submitting an ARC DP EOI

Time: 12-1pm

Where: Level 7 meeting room

Professors Julie McLeod and Kate Reynolds will go through on how to write a good ARC DP EOI

  • How to use the limited space available to nail the description of the problem, research gap and potential benefit
  • How w to explain the proposed methodology to show feasibility has been carefully considered in the project design
  • How convincingly argue the appropriateness of the track record of the proposed team
  • How to successfully convince assessors the application should proceed to the stage two full proposal.

RSVP foe-research@unimelb.edu.au if you wish to attend by 4 November

2. Congratulations to Dr Chelsea Hyde for being awarded a UoM 2025 Civic and Community Impact Fund

Chelsea will be working with Dr Fiona Bailey (Melbourne Psychology Clinic) on the project “Guiding good practice in educational assessment in regional Victoria”.

3. Congratulations to Dr Hugh Gundlach for being awarded funding from the Collier Charitable Fund

Hugh’s project is to investigate “Diversity and inclusion in secondary English texts”.

4. Congratulations to Professor Melitta Hogarth and her team on receiving the 2025 Distinguished Australian First Nations Creative Leadership Award from the Deans and Directors of Creative Arts (DDCA).

The DDCA Award recognised Melitta’s leadership in developing Ngarrngga education resources, created to support the landmark exhibition 65,000 Years: A Short History of Australian Art, currently being held at the Potter Museum of Art. The 391 resources and additional professional learning initiatives created by the Ngarrngga team provide educators and students necessary context, case studies and activities to get the most out of the exhibition.

5. NDRP Commissioned Research Project – closes 21 November

If you are applying contact foe-research@unimelb.edu.au asap

Applications are now open for the NDRP’s first Commissioned Research Project. This project will focus on improving the transition of young people with disability from education and training into employment.

The research focus

NDRP are seeking highly experienced research teams to explore the systems and organisational factors that affect:

  • Young NDIS participants’ ability to make genuine, informed choices about career support
  • Service providers’ capacity to deliver best practice career transition support.​

This research will focus on creating systemic change, not trialling specific interventions.
How this project was shaped

This research topic was developed through extensive community engagement, including:

  • Consultation with Disability Representative Organisations
  • Review of existing lived experience evidence
  • Roundtable discussions with government, researchers, and community representatives.

Three opportunities

We will fund three research teams. Each opportunity focuses on a different group of young NDIS participants (aged 15–25) who receive employment assistance supports:​ ​​​

OPPORTUNITY 1: Broad focus. Covers all population groups who receive support (noting that Autistic young people and young people with intellectual disability are two primary recipient groups).

OPPORTUNITY 2: First Nations focus. Specifically focuses on younger Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander NDIS participants.

OPPORTUNITY 3: Complex support or communication needs focus. Focuses on participants with complex support or communication needs (for example, Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) users, Deaf or Hard-of-Hearing young people)

Opportunities 2 and 3 may also include NDIS participants aged 15–25 who don’t currently have employment assistance supports, but who are interested in employment.

Each project will receive $190,000 over a 12-month duration. 

https://www.ndrp.org.au/research/commissionedresearchproject

6. Vic Health Impact Research Grant – closes 15 December

If you are applying contact foe-research@unimelb.edu.au asap

VicHealth is looking for teams led by researchers who work with communities, policy makers, and/or practitioners to create real-world impact.

Proposals must focus on changing the systems that affect our health and wellbeing, not just individual behaviours. The aim is to discover what gets in the way of good health and work to remove those barriers.

Proposals will get priority if they show how target communities are involved in planning, developing, and carrying out the research translation strategy.

The 2026 Impact Research Grants (IRGs) will support four research projects across Victoria.
– Each project can apply for up to $245,000 in funding
– Funding is provided over a two-year period, starting July 2026
– The total funding pool for this round is $980,000.

Click here to view full funding guidelines on the provider’s website.