CALL FOR ONE PhD RESEARCH FELLOWSHIP FOR THE DOCTORAL PROGRAM IN TRANSPORT SYSTEMS - CERIS

Admissibility requirements
Applicants should comply with the following:
• Be Portuguese citizens, or citizens of other European Union member states;
• Be citizens from third-party states;
• Stateless;
• Citizens benefiting from political refugee status.
Applicants to PhD Scholarships need to:
•Hold a bachelor or master degree at Engineering, Management, Economics, Mathematics, Geography, Information Systems or in related areas;
•Have permanent residence in Portugal, if the work plan is partially carried out at a foreign institution (mixed scholarships), a requirement applicable to both national and foreign citizens.
•Not have a doctor degree, not having benefited from a PhD scholarship or PhD scholarship in industry directly financed by FCT, regardless of its duration.

Application Admissibility Requirements
It is essential, under penalty of not being considered to the Call, to submit the following documents:
•Details of identification document/passport;
• The applicant's Curriculum Vitae;
•Certificates of the academic degrees held, specifying the final classification and, if possible, the grades obtained in all courses, or, alternatively, the candidate's declaration of honor on how he / she concluded the bachelor's or master's degree by the end of the of application deadline;
•Registration of recognition of academic degrees awarded by foreign higher education institutions and registration of the conversion of the respective final classification to the Portuguese classification scale, or, alternatively, the applicant's declaration of honor on how he/she obtained the recognition of a foreign degree equivalent to bachelor or master until the until the contract beginning date;
•Motivation letter, specifying the work area (s) and advisors;
•Recommendation letters
•The application and all associated documents, including motivation and recommendation letters, must be written in Portuguese or in English.
Regarding the aforementioned admissibility requirements, the following should be noted:
•In the case of academic degrees awarded by foreign higher education institutions, and in order to ensure the application of the principle of equal treatment to candidates who hold foreign and national academic degrees, it’s compulsory the recognition of these degrees and the conversion of the final classification to the Portuguese classification scale.
•The recognition of foreign academic degrees and diplomas as well as the conversion of the final classification to the Portuguese classification scale may be required in any public higher education institution, or at Direcção-Geral do Ensino Superior (DGES, just for automatic recognition). For more about this subject please check http://www.dges.gov.pt.
•Only applicants who have completed the studies cycle leading to a bachelor or master degree until the end of the application period, will be admitted. If they do not yet have the course certificate, a declaration of honor from the candidates will be accepted. The granting of the scholarship will depend on the presentation of proof of the academic qualifications required.

PAYMENT OF SCHOLARSHIP COMPONENTS
Payments due to the scholarship holder are made by bank transfer, to the account identified in the scholarship holder's file. The monthly allowance is paid on the first business day of each month.
Payments of registration, enrollment or tuition fee components are made by FCT directly to the national institution where the holder is enrolled for the PhD.

Evaluation Criteria
The evaluation takes into account the applicant’s merit and his suitability for the Research Unit program. Admitted applications will be scored on a scale of 0 to 20 according the following evaluation criteria:
•Criteria A – Academic Classifications in Engineering, Management, Economics, Mathematics, Geography, Information Systems or similar area (45%)
A1 – Bachelor (60%)
A2 – Master (40%)
•Criteria B – Relevant research experience for the PhD project (30%;)
•Criteria C – Institution (that issued the mandatory degrees) reputation (15%)
•Criteria D – Motivation letter (5%)
•Criteria E – References (5%)
Applicants will be ranked according to the weighted average of the classification obtained in each of the 5 criteria mentioned above, according the following formula:
In case of tie-breaking, the ranking of applicants will be carried out based on the ratings assigned to each of the
evaluation criteria in the following order of precedence: criteria A, criteria B, criteria C, criteria D, criteria E.
For the purpose of deciding on the granting of scholarships, the first 5 will be interviewed and given a rating from 0 to 20. The following formula will obtain the final classification of applicants:
Important notice for applicants with diplomas issued by foreign higher education institutions:
•Candidates with diplomas issued by foreign higher education institutions can apply and will be evaluated using the same criteria as candidates with diplomas issued by Portuguese institutions, as long as they submit, in their application, proof of recognition of academic degrees and conversion of final classification for the Portuguese classification scale in terms of the applicable legislation.
•Applicants with foreign degrees recognized who do not show proof of conversion of the final classification to the Portuguese classification scale will be evaluated with the minimum classification (10 points) in criteria (A).
•In any case, scholarship contracts with candidates holding diplomas issued by foreign institutions will only be concluded upon presentation of proof of recognition of academic degrees and conversion of the final classification, as indicated above.
Applicants whose application is evaluated with a final classification below (14) points are not eligible for the scholarship.

EVALUATION
The evaluation jury of the applicants is composed by the following members:
• Luís Guilherme de Picado Santos, Instituto Superior Técnico
• Dídia Isabel Cameira Covas, Instituto Superior Técnico;
• João António de Abreu e Silva, Instituto Superior Técnico;
• José Manuel Coelho das Neves, Instituto Superior Técnico (alternate);
The evaluation jury will assess applications in accordance with the evaluation criteria of this Call, considering the elements of evaluation. All panel members, including the coordinator, are committed to respect a set of responsibilities essential to the evaluation process, such as the duties of impartiality, the declaration of any potential conflict of interest situations and confidentiality. At all times during the evaluation process, confidentiality is fully protected and ensured in order to guarantee the independence of all opinions produced.
Jury members, including the coordinator, cannot be advisors or co-supervisors of applicants of this Call.
For each application, a final evaluation form will be produced by the panel, in which the arguments that led to the ratings attributed to each of the evaluation criteria and sub-criteria will be presented in a clear, coherent and consistent manner.
Minutes of the responsibility of all its members will be produced from the meetings of the evaluation panel. Minutes and annexes must include the following information:
• Name and affiliation of all members of the evaluation panel;
•Identification of all excluded applications and respective reasons;
•Methodology adopted by the panel for particular cases;
•Final Evaluation Sheets for each applicant;
•Provisional list of classification and ranking of applicants, in descending order of the final classification, of all applications evaluated by the panel;
•CDI statements from all panel members
•Possible delegations of votes and competences due to justified absence