Application for the Academies' Programme

The call for proposals for the research programme of the German Academies of Sciences and Humanities (Academies Programme) for 2027 can be found here.

Information for applicants of new projects for the Academies Programme can be found here.

Project proposals for the Academies' Program are carefully reviewed by the Academy before a project application can be submitted to the Union of German Academies. This review is essentially carried out by the Academy's Project Commission, which is set up specifically for new projects and supports and accompanies the development of the application during the review process.
Pre-applications for projects that are eligible for the Academies' Program are discussed by the Project Commission. If there is fundamental agreement on the quality and suitability of the proposal, the applicants are invited to develop a full proposal.
Submitted full proposals are reviewed by the project commission, which may provide the applicants with suggestions for further improvement and revision. If the project commission does not consider the full proposal to have any deficiencies, it is submitted to the external expert review organized by the Union of Academies. As a rule, three written reviews are obtained.
As soon as the expert reports are available, the project commission discusses the application situation in the light of the expert reports and decides on a recommendation for acceptance to the Academy Presidium. If the Presidium agrees with this recommendation, the Academy applies to the Union of German Academies for the planned project to be included in the Academies' Program. The Union's Scientific Commission (WiKo) then compiles a ranking of all the applications submitted by the eight academies and recommends to the Union's Presidium that the highest-rated projects be accepted. Funding then begins in the calendar year following the WiKo's decision meeting.