Engagement Seed Awards

How to apply:

Do you have a great idea to engage a general audience with your research, but lack the funds to realise it? Contact huongvtq@oucru.org.

Seed Award funding is open to researchers across OUCRU Indonesia and Vietnam with grants of up to $10,000 USD awarded per project.

Seed Awards exist to help OUCRU researchers to lead and conduct engagement projects. Since its launch in September 2015, a total of $233,395 USD has been awarded to fund 41 projects.

In 2015 the Public and Community Engagement team surveyed OUCRU researchers and found that researchers were increasingly aware of the need to incorporate public and community engagement (PCE) in their work, but many were uncertain about what to do and how to do it. In addition, often they did not have funding to put towards realising their ideas, nor did many OUCRU researchers have access to international funding opportunities.

The Seed Award grants provide a mechanism for funding engagement work led by researchers who are not eligible for international funding. They also provide support for researchers to realise their ideas for public engagement.

Application

During the application process, all researchers are supported by the Public Engagement Seed Awards team who helps them to design their projects and write an application. Successful awardees are then offered an individual session with the Seed Award coordinator to develop an implementation and evaluation plan.

Calls for applications are issued twice a year and a panel, including external engagement experts, review applications.

Criteria to be considered by the panel:

The feasibility of project proposals
The quality of engagement activities and outputs
The relevance to OUCRU research.
How delivering the project would develop the researchers’ skills
The potential to plan more engagement around their research in the future.

After funding

Those who are successful in their application are then invited to quarterly meetings for all award holders.

These meetings are an opportunity for discussion around engagement topics and skills training needed for conducting public engagement and include topics such as how community engagement can benefit your research, setting up a community advisory board, and community inclusive evaluation processes

These meetings also provide a valuable networking opportunity for researchers who have the same interest in public engagement.