Deadline: 18-Nov-22
Applications are now open for #iwill Fund 2022.
The #iwill Fund is made possible thanks to £66 million joint investment (£33 million seed funding each) from The National Lottery Community Fund and the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) to support young people to access high quality social action opportunities.
#iwill is a UK-wide campaign that aims to make social action part of life for as many 10- to 20-year-olds as possible. Through collaboration and partnership, it is spreading the word about the benefits of youth social action.
Aims
The #iwill Fund looks to support activities that create opportunities for young people aged 10-20 to develop their character and their capacity to significantly contribute to their community.
The program aims to increase overall participation of young people in meaningful social action, with a particular focus on deprived areas and young people aged 10-14.
Social action involves activities such as campaigning, fundraising and volunteering and has huge potential to create enjoyable opportunities and skills development for young people, and in turn benefit the local people and places.
Priorities
The Fund will prioritize projects that:
- Are working with young people at the younger end of the spectrum (10-14 years old)
- Seek to increase participation from young people from less affluent social economic groups, hard to reach groups and people who might not usually take part in social action, in particular:
- young people from socio-economically deprived areas and communities, specifically those scoring lower than 20% on the indices of multiple deprivation.
- young people in areas of economic deprivation and those ethnic groups that have been hit especially hard by the Covid-19 pandemic
- Build the appetite of young people to continue with social action; support habit forming behavior; leave a legacy of behaviour/activity after the funding stops
- Involve young people in planning, delivery and evaluation.
- Give young people the opportunity to learn new skills and develop their character and confidence.
- Give young people the platform to get their voice heard.
- This fund aims to develop opportunities rather than fund the provision of existing youth work. The fund is looking to fund organizations that support young people to thrive and where the involvement of young people in social action will improve the outcomes of the organization.
- Skills development projects, which help young people be ‘social action-ready’ are as valuable as existing project delivery itself.
Funding Information
- Grants are between £1,000 and £10,000.
- Projects can be up to a year in duration.
- Grants should deliver social action opportunities for young people aged 10 to 20 years old, or 25 for people with disabilities.
- Community foundations will prioritize young people between the ages of 10 to 14, as well as young people from socio-economically deprived areas and communities (see priorities section below).
Six principles of social action
Projects must demonstrate how they will apply all six principles of youth social action:
- Reflective – recognising contributions as well as valuing critical reflection and learning.
- Challenging – stretching and ambitious as well as enjoyable and enabling.
- Youth Led – led, owned and shaped by young people’s needs, ideas and decision making.
- Socially impactful – have a clear and intended benefit to a community, cause or social problem.
- Progressive – sustained, and providing links to other activities and opportunities.
- Embedded – accessible to all, and well-integrated to existing pathways to become a habit for life.
Eligibility Criteria
- This fund is open to registered charities, constituted community groups and other charitable organisations including Social Enterprises and CICs in England.
- National organizations with local branches (with their own management committee and bank account) can apply.
- New organizations that can demonstrate they are financially robust can apply.
For more information, visit https://one-community.org.uk/how-to-apply-for-funding-grants-available/