Cut in PhD and post-doctoral FCT was brutal

Awarded 298 PhD and 233 post-doctoral scholarships by the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT). The Association of Fellows Scientific Research (ABIC) has scored protest for January 21.

The year 2014 began with bad news for science, after learning, on Wednesday (16) , the overall results of applications for PhD and post-doctorate awarded by the FCT.

Of the 3416 candidates for PhD scholarships, only 298 received the scholarship. In the case of post-doctorates, scientists only 233 received scholarships between 2305 applications.

ABIC believes that the cuts are greater than 50 percent when it comes to PhD and post-doctoral and considers that the FCT had room to allocate more scholarships.

Annually, FCT, state foundation that manages an important part of the funding that goes to science, open competitions for individual PhD and post-doctoral. In the past decade, at the height of the funding for science in Portugal, arrived in 2031 to be awarded scholarships and 914 doctoral scholarships for post - doctorate in 2007 . Thanks to this investment , the number of doctorates in Portugal climbed to the European level . However , since 2010 the number of grants awarded has declined , following the economic crisis .

And the numbers published herein are overwhelming. In the case of post-doctorates, this year was that we had the highest number of nominations ever, the results show a decrease of 65% compared to 2012.

To meet application deadlines and application, many researchers have spent money on tuition and other expenses that can not continue to bear, remember this association .

For PhD scholarships, recognition is more complex. 2013 were awarded for the first time 431 new PhD scholarships Doctoral Programs FCT, according to information provided by the FCT. These doctoral programs are managed by universities and research centers in various areas, which have the responsibility of choosing the students who attribute the bags .

It was known that there would be a decrease in the number of individual doctoral scholarships . Still, the result shows a significant cut . The sum of the individual grants that were awarded with the PhD FCT equals about 729 bags. If we compare this value with the numbers 2012, where 1198 PhD scholarships were awarded, there is a decrease of almost 40%.