Building Better Opportunities Briefing

Thames Valley Berkshire LEP and The Big Lottery are holding a briefing session on Monday 25 January 2016 aimed at organisations in Berkshire who are interested in being a delivery partner for two Building Better Opportunities (BBO) projects: ‘addressing barriers to work in urban and rural areas’ and ‘promoting enterprise’.

Following an earlier competition, this briefing is aimed at new applicants, as well as those who were unsuccessful in the first round.

The briefing will provide an opportunity for you to share your views on how we might re-design the opportunities ahead of the re-launch and help applicants understand what makes a bid more likely to succeed.

The Big Lottery has published guidance on lessons learned from BBO for organisations considering applying, which can be downloaded here: https://www.biglotteryfund.org.uk/global-content/programmes/england/building-better-opportunities

The Big Lottery Fund is matching funds from the European Social Find (ESF) 2014-2020 to provide joint investment in local projects supporting families with complex needs, addressing barriers to work in urban and rural areas and promoting enterprise. For more information, click here:  https://www.biglotteryfund.org.uk/global-content/programmes/england/building-better-opportunities/ 

Book a place here:
https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/building-better-opportunities-briefing-tickets-20099805058

EMI Sound Education Equipment Awards

EMI Music Sound Foundation is an independent music education charity that to improve young peoples' access to music education in the UK & Ireland.

Eligibility 
Individuals in full time education to fund musical instrument/equipment purchase. 
Schools to fund music education in the form of instruments, equipment and workshops (with the exception of statutory national curriculum music teaching) 

What For?
The EMI Music Sound Foundation provides Instrument and/or Equipment awards which allows schools, music teachers and individuals in full time education to apply directly to the Foundation for assistance with the purchase of musical instruments and/or equipment. 

The Foundation has helped over two thousand schools, individual students and teachers improve their access to music through the purchase or upgrade of musical instruments and equipment

How Much? 
The Foundation provides grants up to a total of £2,000 towards the purchase of musical instruments and/or equipment for individuals who are in full time education and Schools who require the equipment to fund music education. 

Deadline 
The deadline for their next round of applications is: Monday 8th February 2016. However please note that any applications received after Monday 8th February 2016 will automatically be deferred to the next Trustees meeting. 

More Information
http://www.emimusicsoundfoundation.com/index.php/site/awards/ 

Article courtesy of Bruce Wright Funding Matters 

£100,000 Grant Fund opens to reduce re-offending

The Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) for Thames Valley, Anthony Stansfeld, and the Chief Constable, Francis Habgood, have today (04/12) opened a new grant round of the Police Property Act Fund.

The Fund, which is jointly managed by the PCC and the Chief Constable, is created from money recovered by the police and the proceeds from the sale of items that cannot be returned to identified owners, which includes seizures from criminals.

This is the second round of applications for 2015/16 and the PCC and Chief Constable expect to allocate around £100,000 in this round.

Applications are now invited from local voluntary and community groups who contribute towards the PCC's objective of 'Reducing Crime by Reducing Reoffending'.

Closing Date: Thursday 31st December 2015

For more information and the application pack please click here 

Courtesy of SCVS

Village SOS: Support, Outreach and Sustainability

Village SOS is all about helping communities to survive and thrive. We want to help communities become more enterprising. That might be by keeping services such as shops or playgroups alive for your village or by starting up a new enterprise that could create income to benefit your local area.

A community comes together for a BBQ
With more and more rural communities doing it for themselves Village SOS will help you to re-establish or reinvent services and reinvigorate your community.

Who can get involved with Village SOS?
Anyone with an interest in enterprising rural community action can become a member of the campaign – whether you’ve got experience to share, or want to learn from others, please sign up now to find out more.

Who can ask for support from Village SOS?
Projects, potential projects and organisations that provide a service to their local rural community with a population of fewer than 10,000. Once registered CCB, as a partner organisation, can help you through the process by providing advice and guidance

The five-step VSOS support package:
Step 1 – Sign up as a VSOS Member. Every project supported must sign up, as a VSOS member – it’s free!
Step 2 – More information needed. If you would like support as a project you’ll need to talk to the VSOS Hub, or your nearest partner organisation - CCB, to give us some more details about your project. You can express an interest on the member sign-up form and we’ll give you a call.
Step 3 – It’s all about action planning. You will get support and advice from your local VSOS partner organisation to develop an action plan for your project that matches your needs, ability and timescales.
Step 4 – Action. Through one-to-one support locally, and with the help of expert mentors, you will bring your project’s plan of support to fruition.
Step 5– Preparing for the future. Once your plan of support is complete, a final report of all activity will be written up by your support organisation, this may also include future actions for your consideration.

Who is my local support organisation?
Village SOS is a UK-wide campaign, and there are local partners in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland available to help you now. This ensures communities are able to access support and advice from an organisation that knows their area. In Berkshire the Community Council for Berkshire is the local partner - contact us on admin@ccberks.

Funding - West Berkshire Council Building Community Together Fund

Building Community Together Fund
West Berkshire Council “Building Community Together Fund” is available over the next two years and will close in November 2017.

Local community groups can bid for funds from this pot to help them take responsibility for providing projects and services in their communities to meet local needs. The primary purpose of the money is to provide “start up” or “seed corn” funding to assist community based projects to start up. Funding provided would be on the basis that any service established would need to be self financing from the outset.

WBC have created a fund of £150,000 (£100k capital and £50k revenue) to provide one-off funding to help communities get their ideas going. Grants up to a maximum of £12,000 will normally be permitted.  However, in exceptional circumstances this amount may be exceeded.  As part of this funding there will also be a “small bids” category for grants of between £500 - £1,000.

WBC want to encourage creativity and innovation in our communities. Your proposal needs to meet a recognised community need. They are particularly interested in schemes that are relevant to more than one priority area: 
1. Community hubs: Small investment in local community buildings to enable them to be utilised more by the community   and better used as outreach points for disseminating information/advice. 
2. Elderly and vulnerable: Schemes such as luncheon clubs, befriending schemes, volunteer-led practical help services   or hospital transport schemes, etc) 
3. Flood prevention: Efforts to provide flood prevention measures for small scale equipment or items which improve coordination during flood or other extreme weather episode.
4. Child Protection and Family Support: For example local working groups/networks that help address the dynamics within families for better outcomes for all family members and enhanced protection of vulnerable children. Finding ways to prevent pupil exclusions from school, family evictions and homelessness, etc. 
5. Crime and Anti-Social Behaviour: Finding practical and innovative ways to reduce crime, anti-social behaviour and          repeat offending behaviour.
6. Emotional and Mental Health: Support for schemes which improve the physical and emotional health outcomes for local residents.
7. Skills and Jobs: Schemes that increase employment, volunteering, educational attainment, skills development, debt management or job creation ventures.       
8. Children and Young People: Schemes that encourage physical, social and emotional wellbeing in children and young people e.g. youth clubs, sports provision or other activity. 

For full details please click here 

Courtesy of EWB

The Galaxy Hot Chocolate Fund 2015/16

Supporting warm-hearted people and projects

Every week, until February 28 2016, we will be looking to help local community groups and charities across the UK and Ireland by awarding five £300 cash awards a week.
Four of these will be awarded by our judges’ panel. There will also be a People’s Choice Award every week which will be awarded to the entry with the most votes in any given week.

http://galaxyhotchocolate.com/

First Steps Enterprise Fund

First Steps Enterprise Fund is offering loan-grant (90% loan/10% grant) packages to charities and social enterprises working in communities in England to help them grow their services and become more sustainable.

Eligibility 
The fund is open to organisations that meet all of the following criteria: 
1) Community groups with well evidenced local connections as set out below: 
Organisations established for charitable, benevolent or philanthropic purposes. Our usual expectation will be that applicant organisations have one of the following types of legal structure:
⦁    Registered charity; 
⦁    Community interest company; 
⦁    Company limited by guarantee that is non-profit distributing 
⦁    IPS community benefit society that is non-profit distributing
2) Based and working in England. 
3) Organisations operating for longer than a year 
4) Applying for an investment of up to £30,000, of which 10% will be a grant. 
5) Able to repay the loan in 4 years at 5% (with a capital holiday in the first year- during which only interest is payable). 
6) Able to provide evidence of need for activities outlined in the proposal. 
7) Able to demonstrate the benefits to the community that arise from the proposed work.
What For?
It is a pilot partnership between Asda Foundation and the Social Investment Business Foundation. 
This fund is for community enterprises looking to take on their first loan to help the organisation move forward from start-up stage. 

Charities and social enterprises working in communities in England will be able to apply for a loan-grant package of up to £30,000 (10% will be a grant) to help them grow their services and become more sustainable. These investments are the first step towards accessing the wider social investment market and more financing options. 

How Much? 
You can apply for up to £30,000 and eligible organisations will have been operating for longer than one year. 

Deadline 
Deadline is noon Friday 11 December 2015. 

More Information
http://www.sibgroup.org.uk/firststeps/?utm_campaign=First+Steps+Enterprise+Fund+campaign+2015&utm_source=emailCampaign&utm_medium=email&utm_content= 

Information courtesy of Bruce Wright Funding Matters