Deadline: 31-Jan-24
Applications are now open for the VocTech Activate Grant Fund to support the development of new ideas that use digital tools and approaches to transform how people gain skills for work.
Objective
- It aims to improve UK productivity by making innovative use of digital technology to increase the skills of the UK workforce. Its projects are all intended to demonstrate how digital approaches can bring more learning to more people, more of the time in order to improve the workforce skills available to UK businesses and organisations, and improve outcomes for individuals by enhancing their workplace skills.
Funding Information
- VocTech Activate provides grants of between £30,000 and £60,000 for projects lasting up to 12 months.
What will VocTech Activate grant fund?
- VocTech Activate will grant fund the design, development and early stage testing of novel approaches to digital vocational learning; helping to take those ideas through basic prototyping to the next stage of ‘seeding the market’ by delivering a first proof of concept prototype and planning a route to market. This could include:
- Design, development, and prototyping.
- Refining learning design.
- Small scale testing with users.
- Planning a route to market & strategies for scaling.
- Project Management.
- Evidencing impact & what works.
- Projects must:
- Focus on adult vocational learning in the UK (be aimed at adults 16+).
- Offer new learning tools, not just new learning content.
- Show real innovation and risk to justify Ufi funding.
- Show a clear understanding of the vocational learning market, have evidence of a defined learning need and describe how they expect the tech will improve outcomes for learners, in addition to the technical advances.
- Show real innovation and risk to achieve a step change beyond normal business development to justify Ufi funding.
- Have a strong evidenced connection to a clearly defined learner group, and a clear understanding of their challenges, barriers to learning and barriers to adoption of technology-based approaches.
- Have plans for testing with relevant learners/trainers/employers and for incorporating feedback from testing into product development.
- Show ambition and vision for how the project could get to market and be eventually scaled up to reach a large number of learners, if the proof of concept proves successful.
What is VocTech Activate looking for?
- They want to see innovative digital vocational learning ideas which are:
- Genuinely innovative in their overall approach, their technology, or the sector or community of learners to which they will be applied.
- Ideas where people are really thinking differently about how to use technology to deliver effective vocational learning at scale.
- Ideas which have a strong evidenced connection to a clearly defined learner group, and a clear understanding of their challenges, barriers to learning and barriers to adoption of technology-based approaches.
- Projects that look at any and every aspect of vocational learning, including (but not limited to) design and development of learning tools, new delivery models, evaluation and assessment, accreditation and recording evidence of achievement.
- Projects targeted at extending learning provision to sectors, industries and communities of learners that currently lack good access to vocational learning due to factors including market/sectoral structures, cost, time, distance or language.
- They are keen to draw upon the insights they have gathered from market intelligence work and engagement with stakeholders. These have highlighted areas where they feel there is a both a need for innovation in adult vocational skills and opportunity for scale. Issues, for example, include:
- Innovation in assessment, enabling learners to access feedback and content tailored to them, when they need it.
- Innovative use of data, including AI and big data to improve outcomes for learners.
- Making it easier and cheaper for trainers and teachers to develop their own high quality, interactive e-learning content for vocational learners.
- Working with relevant employers and learning organisations to create new ways for people to validate their skills and create pathways to work, or to allow people in work to transition to new opportunities.
Eligibility Criteria
- Ufi funding is open to all organisations, including charities, trade bodies, learning providers, employers, private companies, community interest companies and other not for profit organisations.
- Where Ufi funds a project where the partner/partners are not charities, they must exercise due diligence to ensure that any private benefit that is generated is no more than incidental to the public benefit. This means that any benefit accruing to a non-charitable organisation does not exceed what is necessary to generate the stated public benefit of the project, in line with Ufi’s charitable objectives.
- Ufi is a UK based charity and only funds projects which directly benefit vocational learners in the UK. The majority of applications they fund are UK-based. They will consider applications from organisations based outside the UK if they can clearly demonstrate how they will address vocational learning opportunities in the UK.
- They recognise that addressing overseas markets can improve the sustainability of new approaches and projects would not be disadvantaged if this is part of a longer term business plan, but they don’t include the assessment of non-UK beneficiaries when they make a funding decision.
- They are keen to encourage applications from anywhere within the UK. They deliver pre-application webinars to try to ensure that potential applicants can engage with them, whereever they are based.
- They welcome partnership approaches to project delivery. Applications can be strengthened by demonstrating a collaborative approach, especially where employers and digital learning specialists are working together. Collaborative working can help to ensure that your main project idea is addressing a recognised learning need; and can provide a route for early stage testing with learners.
- They are flexible about how collaborative projects are structured but expect to see this clearly reflected in the project management arrangements and for all partners to be active project participants. They have no view on who should be the lead partner in projects – they expect partners to reach their own decision on which of them is best suited to lead the project.
For more information, visit Ufi VocTech Trust.