The Russell Invests Charitable Fund has opened for applications to its 2010 programme. Funding of up to £5,000 (£3,000 is more likely) is potentially availabe to organisations working with young people not in education, employment or training or at risk of being so.

Priority Areas

The fund supports organisations that work with young people not in education, employment or training (NEET), or those at risk of becoming NEET.

Priority Areas:

1. Supporting individuals whose circumstances have changed as a result of the recession
2. Support NEET young people who are not currently being reached/engaged by other statutory/voluntary sector support programmes
3. Working with individuals who have been specifically identified as being at risk of becoming NEET.

Who is eligible?

Voluntary and Community Groups, and Social Enterprises with an income of under £150,000 pa. Priority will be given to organisations with an income of less that £100,000.

Funding Available

The maximum grant is £5,000, however, groups are advised to apply for around £3,000 as few maximum grants will be made.

Exclusions

The grant cannot be used to fund the following:

• conferences/seminars
• film production
• publicity/advertising in the media
• professional clubs/associations
• sports events/tournaments/team sponsorship
• political campaigns or concerns
• religious organisations where the activities benefit only those of a particular faith
• statutory organisations such as Local Authorities, schools and the Police force
• individuals
• spending that has already taken place

Futher information

Further information is available on the Capital Community Foundation website including full guidelines and an application form. The guidelines also include details of the application process and subsequent monitorng process.

Deadline for applications

The deadline for receiving completed applications with all supporting documentation is Friday 2nd July 2010.

THE LEARNING PARTNERSHIP PROJECT

The Learning Partnership Project was launched by Voluntary Action Lewisham in August 2008. Its aim was to develop a partnership approach which would use resources more effectively to deliver a package of support to the voluntary and community sector (VCS) in Lewisham.

The project had two key elements; to facilitate access to training and learning opportunities for VCS staff that could enable career development and aid organizational sustainability. This involved working with other voluntary and community organisations in the borough as well as statutory and private training providers.  The project also built on previously developed relationships and actively engaged with and fostered relationships with appropriate agencies, working to implement referral processes and systems to meet individual needs.

The second was to promote economic growth within the VCS by encouraging the sector to be more enterprising. Working with Simple Business Solutions and the London Borough of Lewisham a comprehensive programme of support to Lewisham’s VCS was established and delivered to equip organisations in maximising their resources and reducing their dependency on grant funding.

The Training Programme

The Training Programme was designed to provide a wide range of courses that would provide learners with personal development opportunities for learners, capacity support for organisations and important legal information for the VCS. Courses offered and the numbers that attended have been included in the table below:

Learner’s Feedback

1. How to Win Funders Attention
   • Learners felt that more courses should be offered in this area.
   • That detailed documentation should be provided for reference.
2. Reaching the Hard to Reach
   • All learners joining this course did so in order to widen the reach to more excluded groups
   • The course attracted a number of staff from the statutory organisations whose role it is to work with harder to reach groups.
3. Managing and Sustaining Community Buildings
   • The course was described as one of the most ‘helpful courses ever attended.’
   • Participants felt that information given would help to improve their organisation.
4. Quality Assurance
   • After attending this course participants felt better equipped to choose the appropriate quality mark for the organisation.
   • Most participants said their immediate course of action after completing the course was to apply for funding to carry out their quality assurance.
5. Roles and Responsibilities of a Management Committee
   • Course was attended entirely my management committee members all of whom stated they were unaware of most of their roles and responsibilities as the course had highlighted.
6. Train the Trainer
   • Some attendants expressed the desire to pursue an accredited qualification on the subject.
7. Marketing Master class
   • Attendants felt that they had gained tools they could bring back to their organisation.
   • Some felt that the subject was too large and needed to be broken down into smaller modules.

Promoting Economic Growth by being more enterprising

VAL commissioned Simple Business Solutions to run a Community Organisations Capacity Building Pilot Project. The objective of this project was to practically help 5  targeted voluntary and community sector organisations (VCSOs)  in Lewisham to become better positioned and equipped to maximise their resources and eventually reduce their dependency on grants. The pilot project started in August 2008 and ended July 2009. Simple Business Solutions (SBS) has been providing support to the following VCSOs:

A number of areas that required attention were identified and an action plan drawn up. For each group offering them a menu of support, advice, and assistance.

This came in the form of :

• 1-2-1 advice and coaching sessions
• Management document review
• Financial reviews
• Ideas generation sessions
• Business support
• Signposting to: other organisations, courses and training opportunities (e.g. custom or offered by VAL, commissioning or funding opportunities).

This work brought to light the different types of problems and challenges that the organisations were facing.

These included:

Resource – time, money and people. All of the organisations claimed to suffer to some degree from a shortage of these three things. Funding and the need for income diversification was a factor in the creation of this pilot. In some organisations, much of people’s time and effort is focused on identifying and performing paperwork for small-scale grants thus preventing any form of action towards developing a strategic direction.

Some organisations have human resource in the form of volunteer staff and yet are unable to make the most use of them. Often the reason for this is that operational management is focused on the low level detail of day to day activity and are therefore unable to take a step back and actually manage the organisation.

Fear and apathy. Many of the problems stem from people’s fear of the unknown. Management sometimes seem reluctant to try something different. This fear can come from a lack of experience, knowledge or skills to take on what is required. There can also be a reluctance to delegate as this may feel like a loss of control. SBS have adopted the approach of taking small steps so as not to overwhelm management.

Decision Making. The decision making process in most of the organisations is slow and sometimes over cautious. The level of change that will move these organisations forward requires less risk averse management or boards. SBS have taken a bottom up approach by helping with some fundamental processes to make the overall running more efficient. This will need to be complimented with a top down initiative that works directly with the boards to get things done.

Jacqui Henry
Learning Partnership Officer
August 2009

Update. Jacqui Henry has since left VAL. Any enquiries about the Learning Partnership Project should be directed towards Jennifer Laing.