Here’s a quick round up of some of the funding calls currently open to support your public engagement activities:
STFC Public Engagement Small Awards Scheme (Deadline 28 April 2016)
Provides funds for small, local or ‘pilot’ projects promoting STFC science and technology. Anyone can apply, including grant-funded research groups, STFC research facility users, schools, museums, etc. Awards range from £500 to £10,000 and the expenditure can go towards materials, salaries and travel & subsistence.
See: http://www.stfc.ac.uk/funding/public-engagement-funding/public-engagement-small-awards-scheme/
Royal Society of Chemistry Outreach Fund (Deadline 29 April 2016)
Our outreach fund provides financial support to individuals and organisations in order to enable them to run chemistry-based events and activities for public audiences. Through the fund we can support our members, and other advocates, to engage with different audiences, and provide people with an entry point into the chemical sciences. We are currently accepting applications for all three grant levels: Small grants: up to £2000; Medium grants: £2000 to £10,000; and Large grants: £10,000 to £25,000.
See: http://www.rsc.org/awards-funding/funding/outreach-fund/
The Biochemical Society scientific outreach grants (Deadline 29 April 2016)
Grants are available to support activities and events that help communicate the excitement of molecular bioscience to young people and the community. Applications are invited for sums up to £1,000 to assist with the direct costs associated with an event and expenses incurred (e.g. transport and/or teacher cover).
See: https://www.biochemistry.org/Grants/ScientificOutreachGrants.aspx
British Pharmacological Society (BPS) outreach grants (Deadline 29 April 2016)
Have you got a great idea for a pharmacology outreach or public engagement activity? Grants of up to £1,500 are available to support innovative pharmacology outreach and public engagement activities. These grants are available to both BPS members and non-members, including schools and teachers. The project should usually take place within six months of the relevant application deadline.
See: https://www.bps.ac.uk/membership-awards/support-for-outreach-and-teaching/outreach-grants
Royal Society Partnership Grants Scheme (Next round opens May 2016)
Through the scheme, grants of up to £3,000 will be available to support teachers, scientists and engineers help develop science projects, with the aim of making the teaching science more interesting within primary and secondary schools. Any UK primary or secondary school teacher and practising scientist/engineer can apply as long as the students involved in the project are between 5 and 18.
See: https://royalsociety.org/grants-schemes-awards/grants/partnership-grants/
Wellcome Trust People and Society Awards (Deadlines: 20 May 2016; 19 August 2016; 18 November 2016)
- People Awards (up to and including £40 000): are for innovative and creative projects that engage the public with biomedical science and/or the history of medicine. They can fund small-to-medium-sized one-off projects or projects that pilot new ideas with an aim to scale up or become sustainable following the grant, or they can part-fund larger projects.
- Society Awards (above £40 000): can fund the scaling-up of successfully piloted projects (whether funded through People Awards or through other means) or can fund projects that are more ambitious in scale and impact than is possible through a People Award. Society Award projects would normally expect to reach audiences with a wide geographical spread across the UK and/or Republic of Ireland. They can also part-fund larger projects. The average level of a Society Award is around £180,000 over 2-3 years.
MRC Alexander Fleming Dissemination Scheme (Deadlines 23 May 2016; 4 October 2016; and 17 January 2017)
The scheme provides funding to support the dissemination of MRC and MRF-funded research results beyond the scientific peer reviewed press, to patients, participants, practitioners (for example health professionals) and policy makers. Dissemination goes beyond making research results available through the traditional vehicles of journal publications and academic conference presentations. It involves the process of extracting the main message or key implication derived from the research results and communicating them to targeted groups in a way that encourages them to factor the research implications into their work (practitioners and policy makers) or lives (patients and the healthy population at large). Awards will be made to meet the costs of the dissemination activities and will be no greater than £30,000.
Wellcome Trust Small Arts Awards up to £40,000 (Deadline 3 June 2016)
The Arts Awards provide grants to projects that engage the public with biomedical science through the arts. The aim of the awards is to support arts projects that reach new audiences which may not traditionally be interested in science and provide new ways of thinking about the social, cultural and ethical issues around contemporary science. The small grants programme offers funding of up to £40,000.
See: http://www.wellcome.ac.uk/Funding/Public-engagement/Funding-schemes/Arts-Awards/index.htm
Pathology: Public Engagement Innovation Grant Scheme (Deadline 13 June 2016)
Our scheme was introduced to give financial support for the delivery of a range of pathology-related events throughout the UK. Grants of up to £1000 are available for individuals or organisations who wish to develop pathology-related public engagement activities or events.
See: https://www.rcpath.org/discover-pathology/events-landing-page/funding-for-public-events.html
Science Communication Awards 2015 (Deadline 30 June 2016)
If you’re a bioscience researcher at a UK university or institute and involved in science communication – apply for the Society of Biology Science Communication Awards. The Awards are intended to reward outreach work carried out by both young scientists and established researchers to inform, enthuse and engage the public.
- New Researcher Prize: £750: Open to bioscience researchers currently reading for a Masters/PhD or in the first year of a post-doctoral position.
- Established Researcher Prize: £1500: Open to bioscience researchers who are beyond the first stages of their research career, as defined in the New Researcher category. The Society is looking for researchers who communicate their own work well, and who represent their own field strongly in the science communication world.
See: https://www.rsb.org.uk/get-involved/awards-and-competitions/science-communication-awards
British Society for Immunology: Communicating Immunology Grants (1 July 2016; 1 October 2016; 15 January 2017; 1 April 2017)
Grants aim to stimulate interest, discussion and understanding of immunology amongst a wider audience, support formal and informal learning about immunology, and target a wide range of audiences, with a particular interest in reaching new or traditionally hard to reach audiences. At least one named applicant on the grant must have been a full member of the BSI for at least one year. Each grant is worth up to a maximum of £1000 and grants are awarded quarterly.
See: https://www.immunology.org/public-engagement/bsi-communicating-immunology-grants
British Ecological Society outreach grants: (Next round opens July 2016)
The British Ecological Society is offering grants of up to £2,000 to promote ecological science to a wide audience. The funding is available for projects that: Increase public understanding of, and engagement with ecology; stimulate discussion about ecology and its implications for society; inspire and enthuse people of all ages about the science of ecology, especially those not previously interested; develop skills in communicating the science of ecology.
See: http://www.britishecologicalsociety.org/grants-awards/outreach-grants/
Royal Academy of Engineering’s grant scheme (Next round opens summer 2016)
Ingenious, the Royal Academy of Engineering’s grant scheme for projects that engage the public with engineers and engineering is now open for applications. They are looking for projects that inspire creative public engagement with engineering, stimulate engineers to share their stories, passion and expertise in innovative ways with audiences and create debate around the impact of engineering. Funding is from £3,000 to £30,000.
See: http://www.raeng.org.uk/grants-and-prizes/ingenious-grant
Institute of Physics (IoP) Public Engagement Grant Scheme (Next round opens September 2016)
The IoP aims to provide positive and compelling experiences of physics for public audiences through engaging and entertaining activities and events. The public engagement grant scheme is designed to give financial support of up to £1500 to individuals and organisations running physics-based events and activities in the UK and Ireland.
See: http://www.iop.org/about/grants/outreach/page_38843.html
Institute of Mathematics Education Grant Scheme (No deadline)
The Institute of Mathematics are looking for grant applications of up to £600 to help with the costs of running or attending an educational activity relating to mathematics. The aim of these grants is to support activities which will help increase the popularity of mathematics with learners and encourage the take up of mathematics post-16. Applications can be submitted at any time.
See: http://ima.org.uk/about_us/support_and_grants/education_grant_scheme.cfm.html
Society of Endocrinology Public Engagement Grant (No deadline)
These grants have been developed to help Society members and public engagement professionals (non-members) organise and deliver outreach activities, aimed at school children and/or the general public, to communicate the science of endocrinology. The grants will provide up to £1,000 of funding. Exceptional applications may be awarded additional funding. Applications are invited all year round, and will be reviewed March and September.
See: https://www.endocrinology.org/grants/grant_publicengagement.html
The Physiological Society of Outreach Grant Scheme (No deadline)
Grants offer members of the Society up to £1000 per calendar year for activities supporting primary, secondary and tertiary education, and events promoting the discussion of physiology with public audiences. We are especially keen to engage hard to reach audiences.
See: http://www.physoc.org/outreach-grants
The following list summarises some of the other funding opportunities, note deadlines have passed, so visit the funder site to watch for further calls:
STFC Public Engagement Large Awards Scheme
The Large Awards Scheme provides funds for projects which are expected to have a significant regional or national impact. We offer awards from £10,000 up to £100,000. Almost anyone can apply but project teams must have strong links with STFC’s scientific research community. We also encourage partnerships that may positively impact on the success of the project e.g. universities with science centres. Projects must be relevant to publicising engagement or teaching about the STFC science and technology areas
See: http://www.stfc.ac.uk/funding/public-engagement-funding/public-engagement-large-awards-scheme/
Society for Microbiology Science education and outreach grants
The Society offers grants to fund relevant science promotion initiatives or to support developments likely to lead to an improvement in the teaching of any aspect of microbiology. Up to £1,000 will be awarded to contribute to the expenses of the proposed activity.
The Physiological Society Public Engagement Grants
The grant scheme aims to inspire creative public engagement with physiology. Grants of up to £5000 are available to both member and non-members of the Society to promote the discussion of physiology with public audiences. We encourage collaborative applications, including those between expert science communicators, facilitators of public engagement, artists, musicians, thespians and our Members.
See: http://www.physoc.org/public-engagement-grants
Posted by Dee-Ann Johnson, Communications Officer, Researcher Development, The University of Manchester