You now have until the 7th of February to apply for the final round of catalyst funding!
Aims and purpose
The Connected Communities Catalyst Fund is intended to support the consolidation of exciting new ideas arising from the Connected Communities programme. Specifically, the fund is intended to explore the question: What new insights relating to the nature, dynamics and role of communities are emerging from CC projects?
The fund will provide resource for project teams to explore promising new empirical insights, practical possibilities or theoretical developments, to deepen their conversations with others working on related issues across the programme, or to challenge their ideas by connecting with others working internationally on the same themes. It will support workshops, writing/making retreats and conference activities that make progress toward substantive new outputs. The fund will be administered on a light touch basis by the Connected Communities Leadership Fellows.
On its completion in 2018, the fund will have supported a series of activities that will have contributed to the development of a substantive new body of knowledge on the theme of Connected Communities.
Scale of the funds
- Approximately £24k will be awarded each year (£48k total)
- A maximum of £3k can be requested per application
- There will be a limit of one successful application per project team
The fund will support activities such as:
- Writing retreats to make progress on substantive collaborative outputs
- Workshops to bring together projects working with similar or contrasting communities to share expertise and insights
- Joint events on emerging themes and ideas on the topic of ‘community’
- Other ideas that will achieve the aims outlined above
Eligibility
- At least two projects (from different institutions) on the CC programme must be involved
- Both community partners and academic partners must be involved in scoping and participating in the activities
- The award is not open to members of large grant teams (the assumption being that large grants have flexibility within their own budgets for these activities), with the exception of research assistants on large grant teams who are eligible to apply to develop their own areas of interest in collaboration with other projects
- Community Co-Investigators and Academics on projects are all eligible to apply for funding
Expected outputs
- New writing: books, websites, guidance, journal papers
- New multi-media, audio-visual, artistic or performance products
- Explicitly excluded outputs are activities that are intended to develop new grant proposals and funding opportunities
Payment and reporting
- A contract will be issued from either the University of Bristol or from the University of East Anglia for the work
- Payment will be to a single organisation for the total amount of the grant
- Payment will be in arrears on submission of the final report which demonstrates the activities have been successfully completed – unless there is a strong reason for access to funds in the early stages of the work
- Final report needs to be delivered within one month of planned project completion.
- The final report should take the form of a 2 page A4 summary of activities including a summary of the substantive outputs achieved, supported by audio/visual material (photographs/film of the activities)
Eligible Costs
- Expected costs include travel, accommodation, catering, documentation support (e.g. photography, transcription, note taking), accessibility assistance (e.g. carers, BSL translation)
- There will be no indirect or estates costs payable and the fund will not cover academic staff time
- Honoraria for community partners with limited economic resources will be allowable if justification is provided
Expected timings
- Activities should begin within 2 months of agreement, and complete within 6 months
Publicity
- The title of the project and the proposal for the activities will be uploaded to the CC fellows website as a matter of course unless there are explicit reasons to prevent this
- The final report will be uploaded to the CC fellows websites as a matter of course
- All outputs should be entered into Researchfish, and links sent to the CC administrators to upload onto the CC fellows website
Application Process
- No more than 2 sides of A4, including the following details
- Primary contact name and details of the lead organisations
- A description of who is involved, including how community and university partners are working together
- A description of the activity and the intended outputs
- Budget and dates
- The intended developments for project participants that will be achieved by the activity
- How the activity contributes to the development of the CC programme
- Submitted by noon on the day of the deadline
Criteria for assessment
These criteria will evolve as the fund evolves over the course of the programme. For the first call, criteria relate to:
- The extent to which the proposal promises to clarify and articulate emerging ideas around community
- Clarity about how community and university partners will be working together to develop new and emerging ideas
- Value for money
- The contribution the activities will make to the CC programme and CC community as a whole
Assessment process
- Deadline for 4th round: Extended to 7th February 2018
- Applications will be reviewed by the Connected Communities Leadership Team (leadership fellows George McKay and Keri Facer). In case of a direct conflict of interest (i.e. applications led by an individual from the same institution), then the relevant LF will not be involved in the selection process.
- Applications to be submitted to r.daniel@uea.ac.uk
- Applicants will be notified by mid-February 2018.
- Earliest start date for projects should be March 2018.
- Final reports will be due August 2018.
