The overwhelming argument I hear from postdocs about not practising open science is that it won't get them a career. This project aims to highlight funding opportunities that reward applicants for working openly, collaboratively and reproducibly. It also aims to save researcher's time by pooling knowledge about funding sources, instead of postdocs, funders and institutions keeping their own siloed spreadsheets. The end outcome? A centralised searchable database of funding opportunities available for postdoctoral researchers, with a website (or other tool) to search and filter the database. A filter would highlight funds available for open researchers.

Website: https://github.com/npscience/OpenCon-FundingDB/issues/2

What kinds of help are we looking for? 

This project is very early-stage, and for it to work, it's going to need a lot of people to help a little. Will you help a little?

Major tasks are:

• Reaching out to the research community (PhDs, postdocs, university scholcomms/career offices, funders) to see if we can use data people have already collected
• Building a well-structured database for the information
• Prototyping the website (mobile-first?) to show off that data, with a search interface
• The nice UI design-y stuff is important too

So there's a whole range of skills needed. What do you fancy? Even a quick 5-minute email to your friends or local research support office would help.

What can you do right now?

1. Join the project slack at https://fundmemaybe-team.slack.com
2. Find out a bit more at https://docs.google.com/document/d/1mASlr3thmHY5nfsrEky7IlP6Cjdy8Q_sAaHrjTnFeSI/edit?usp=sharing (feedback welcome)
3. Check out the github repo at https://github.com/npscience/OpenCon-FundingDB - lots of issues open, please jump straight in
4. Drop me a line at [email protected] if this is the easiest way for you to get in touch. Be sure to let me know how you'd like to be involved. And whether you like cats, dogs, or neither (because that stuff is important).

Thanks so much - I look forward to working with you. You are already my favourite person today :)

Can you be based remotely to help? Yes! Can collaborate from anywhere in the world.

Who do I get in touch with if I want to help out?  If you have questions or are interested in helping out, you can contact Naomi Penfold at [email protected]