Institutional Development Scheme (IDS) Collaborative Research Grant 2025/26 Exercise
  1. The overall quality of proposals had dropped as compared to the last round of exercise.
  1. Some proposals were too ambitious with broad scopes and wide-ranging objectives, while others lacked contributions to theory development. Although innovative approaches and advanced artificial intelligence (AI) technology were proposed in some cases, theoretical foundation was lacking and the research statements were not well articulated.
  1. While some proposals had clear objectives with potential contributions to the society, their academic value was limited in generating new knowledge or insights. The research hypotheses, methods, expected outcomes, and pathways to meaningful impact needed to be aligned coherently.  Project teams were advised to articulate on the research design, level of analysis, sampling strategies, and sustainability of their proposed studies.