Since January 2017, the Programme national d’aide à l’Accueil en Urgence des Scientifiques en Exil - PAUSE (French Programme for the Urgent Aid and Reception of Scientists in Exile) has provided funding for higher education institutions and public research bodies who wish to welcome doctoral students, post-doc students, researchers and lecturers in urgent need for a once-renewable period of one year (twice-renewable for doctoral students) on a conditional basis.

Since the first call for applications in February 2017, Paris 8 University has allocated an annual fund to be designated by SERCIduring calls for applications. The University’s support is arbitrated by the CoRI. So far, ten individuals from Turkey, Iraq, Brazil, Cameroon and Haiti have received this aid.

Eligibility criteria

Candidates must:

• Be able to prove their status (doctoral student, researcher, lecturer or teaching artist)
• Be in a position of danger due to political persecution or violence because of the nature of their research, their political beliefs, their belonging to a minority group, or due to a situation of armed conflict
• Whatever their current place of residence, to have been forced into exile or to have left their home country less than three years ago

Applications procedure

Applications are managed by the institutions. When a call for applications is released by PAUSE, Paris 8 University shares it via the allP8 platform. The laboratory or department that wishes to host a scientist in danger must submit an application with all the main supporting documents that will subsequently be requested by PAUSE and provide information on:

1. the scientific importance of the request (CV, research project or thesis, scientific/teaching aims)
2. the emergency situation (threats, exile route, endangerment, reasons for exile)
3. the connection of the nominee with the host laboratory or department (correlation with the scientific or teaching activity of the laboratory or department, previous collaborations, doctoral project)
4. the support measures to be put in place (class slots, office, funding, French language classes)

Find out more: https://www.college-de-france.fr/site/programme-pause/Espace-de-mise-en-relation-entre-etablissements-volontaires-et-scientifiques.htm

After being assessed by CoRIand if the application is approved, the University will help to finalise the request and submit it on the PAUSE submissions platform.