Education Pathways – Programme Award call

During October 2023, we are running an open call for Programme Award applications through our Education Pathways theme. The ultimate aim of the Education Pathways theme is to help shape an education system that maximises its contribution to wellbeing, is trauma informed with the aim of preventing and reducing poverty in Scotland.

For this open call, our priority area is:

Improving engagement in education and learning for children, young people and their families to prevent and reduce future rates of poverty and trauma in Scotland.

This includes an interest in levels of engagement in formal settings (schools, work experience and vocational learning opportunities and FE/HE for example) but also includes an interest in how work in the informal setting (third sector, community, outdoor and home for example) can improve engagement in learning and education, widen opportunities for children and young people, bridge the attainment gap, and more broadly reduce the risk of poverty in the future.

Programme Award applications are more likely to be successful for work with the highest potential for delivering big change that lasts on tackling poverty and trauma in Scotland. For this open call, this includes work (in line with the priority area above) such as:

• Feasibility and development projects
• Test and demonstration projects
• Research projects with a clear and strong link to delivering change.
• Campaigning, mobilising, policy and influencing projects.

Our Programme Award applications should be for work that would not be eligible through The Trust’s Our Funds.

For example, we will not fund direct service delivery through our Programme Awards, unless it aims to test a new approach which has the potential for wider system change and impact.

Applicants to our Programme Award should be:

• An organisation working in Scotland with an annual income of more than £100,000.
• A charity, asset-locked Community Interest Company, Housing Association or a Credit Union whether alone or in partnership (including with other types of organisations).
• Applying for project-restricted revenue funding for up to five years, usually between £50K and £500K in total, and up to £250k per year. We expect to spend up to £2.5M through this call, subject to level of demand and nature of proposals we receive.
• Interested in supporting meaningful and ethical co-design and co-production with people with experience of poverty and trauma, which will be one of our key criteria in assessing applications.

Applications will be through a two-stage process with an initial Stage 1 short application followed by a full application for those who progress to Stage 2.

To send us your application please complete the Stage 1 application form HERE by midday on Friday 10th November 2023.

For those who successfully progress, Stage 2 will take place from Thursday 14th December 2023 – Friday 9^th February 2024