APPLY: 2024 Commonwealth Foundation Grants For Civil Society Activities

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APPLY: 2024 Commonwealth Foundation Grants For Civil Society Activities

The Commonwealth Foundation Grants provide funding opportunities of up to £30,000 for projects with a maximum duration of two years, aimed at civil society organizations within the Commonwealth.

Our objective is to back projects that aim to foster productive interaction between civil society and decision-makers, with an emphasis on civil society’s involvement in policy formulation and decision-making processes.

All applications must align with at least one of our three priority themes, and they are expected to articulate how they will incorporate gender perspectives into their project planning and execution.

Scholarship Summary

Host: The Commonwealth
Category: Fellowships
Eligible Countries: All Countries
Reward: £200,000
Deadline: October 23, 2023

Details:

The Foundation places its faith in the influence of narratives and storytelling as catalysts for social transformation. Grants will be conferred to support inventive approaches that hold the promise of impacting public discourse.

It is essential that all proposals incorporate the overarching theme of gender throughout the project.

The Commonwealth Foundation Grants are closely aligned with the Commonwealth Charter and its principles and goals, as articulated in the Foundation’s Strategic Plan for 2021-2026. The plan outlines three primary thematic areas of focus.

Health
Environment and climate change
Freedom of expression

Scholarship Requirements:

To be eligible for a Commonwealth Foundation Grants grant, the following criteria must be met:

The applicant and, when applicable, partner(s) are registered not for profit civil society organisations (CSOs).
The applicant and, when applicable, partner(s) must be based in a Commonwealth Foundation member country and the project should take place in an eligible Commonwealth Foundation member country. A list of countries eligible under this call is available at Annex 1.
The application is for funding for a maximum of £50,000 per annum
The applicant is applying for funding for a maximum of four years
The applicant does not have an existing grant from the Commonwealth Foundation at the time the application window is open.
The average of the applicant’s total income over the last two years is less than £3m
The project must address one or both Commonwealth Foundation’s outcomes
The applicant will provide the following documents as part of the application:
- a completed logic model using the Commonwealth Foundation template
- a copy of the organisation’s registration certificate1 (the official registration document provided by the relevant authorities in the country concerned)
- a copy of the organisation’s most recent audited accounts (it must include both the accounts and the opinion of the external auditor who has certified them; it should not be older than December 2016)
- a copy of the registration certificate for all partner organisations

Duration and Reward

The Commonwealth Foundation Grants provide funding of up to £200,000 over a span of four years to endorse innovative project concepts and methodologies. These projects aim to enhance the capacity of civic voices to effectively interact with governments and, in doing so, to enhance governance and development outcomes through their active involvement.

Required Documents

The application procedure for Commonwealth Foundation Grants comprises two stages: an initial application and a comprehensive application. Only organizations that are shortlisted will receive an invitation to submit a full application.

Preliminary applications will be assessed on the criteria below:

The application has a clear problem definition.
The application clearly demonstrates that it is demand driven and relevant.
The project must address one or both Commonwealth Foundation outcomes
The application clearly shows how the planned activities will deliver outputs that lead to the project outcomes.
The organisation(s) has the capacity to deliver the submitted proposal.
The project must mainstream gender in the project design and project plan

Full applications will be assessed on the criteria below, in addition to the criteria used at the preliminary application stage:

The application clearly illustrates a strategy to sustain the positive outcomes from the project beyond the duration of the funding received from the Commonwealth Foundation
There is a clear Monitoring and Evaluation strategy for the project
The project includes a strong gender analysis of the problem, mainstreams gender and identifies how the anticipated change specifically impacts women and girls.

The selection process is rigorous and competitive, and the chosen projects will have been meticulously crafted to carry out activities with the potential to yield one or more of the outcomes outlined in the Foundation’s strategic logic model.