Deadline: 6-Jan-23
Applications for the Weston Charity Awards 2023 are officially open thanks to a collaboration between The Garfield Weston Foundation and charity partner, Pilotlight.
This help for charities is more vital than ever as the cost-of-living crisis escalates. Charities offering community and welfare services are seeing user numbers rocket while donations continue to decline with the threat of recession looming.
Now in its ninth year, the Awards offer a unique package of support worth over £22,000 to small charities in the North of England, the Midlands, and Wales. The Awards nurture leadership talent while amplifying a charity’s potential impact.
Fields
- Your charity must also be working to alleviate disadvantage in one or more of the following fields:
- Community: This includes volunteering work, practical projects to improve an area, running community centres and providing a range of services for their local community, especially for those who may be vulnerable or in need.
- Environment: This includes practical action around sustainable land use and fishing, renewable energy, recycling schemes, biodiversity, species preservation, marine life, education, climate change science and conservation.
- Welfare: This includes helping adults experiencing exclusion, social or economic hardship; people experiencing homelessness; people who are at risk of offending or reoffending; and charities supporting older people or people with disabilities.
- Youth: This includes providing services to children and young people up to the age of 25, such as offering advice and guidance, work experience, training and coaching. Schools are not eligible to apply to the Awards.
Benefits
- The Awards work best for charities that:
- Are ambitious for their future
- Aim to pursue best-practice in their field
- Are open to change and to challenge existing ways of working
- Have an engaged board that is bought into Pilotlight 360; a board member is expected to attend at least one in three meetings.
- Are able to commit sufficient time to the meetings
- Through the Weston Charity Awards, unrestricted grants of £6,500 are available for up to 22 ambitious charities. The cash contributions are available to instigate strategic change and accelerate innovative growth despite current challenges. Winning applicants also gain free access to the Pilotlight 360 programme – a ten-month package of leadership coaching worth an estimated £16,000.
Eligibility Criteria
- To be eligible to apply, your charity must have:
- A registered charity number
- At least one paid full-time member of staff in a leadership position
- Delivered a service for at least two years
- Income of less than £5 million per year
- Provide direct services to beneficiaries
- A degree of financial stability, e.g., secured funding for six months
- A majority of activity or beneficiaries based in the North or Midlands of England or Wales. To check that your area is eligible to apply to the Awards, take a look at their full location list here.
For more information, visit https://www.pilotlight.org.uk/news/grant-applications-now-open-weston-charity-awards-2023
