Timetable
Applications are now closed.
Eligibility
The ‘Discover! Creative Careers’ grants are open to archives in England. For these grants, we cannot fund organisations based in Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland, the Channel Islands, the Isle of Man or whose collections are held outside of the United Kingdom.
One grant will be awarded in each region of England:
- North West
- North East and Yorkshire
- Midlands
- South West
- East and South East
- London
The final two grants will be awarded across the areas that have seen low levels of activity as part of the ‘Discover! Creative Careers’ programme:
- North West
- Midlands
- East and South East
The programme is open to all public sector bodies, not-for-profit organisations including registered charities, and for-profit organisations including business archives. Funding is not available to private individuals. Since the programme promotes career opportunities in the archive sector, organisations applying for this funding must employ a paid member of archive staff. Volunteer-run archives are not eligible for this programme.
Finance and budgeting
Eligible costs for the programme include (but are not limited to) session materials, staff time, staff travel expenses or room hire. School coach hire or other costs required for schools to participate are also eligible.
The programme cannot fund collections acquisition or costs incurred prior to the date of any award offer from us.
The grant may not be used for the following purposes: payments that support activity intended to influence Parliament, Government or political parties, or attempting to influence the awarding or renewal of contracts and grants, or attempting to influence legislative or regulatory action.
Assessment process
These grants have a single-stage application process, completed online via our application form.
While we ask that all applications be submitted via the online form (link above), you can preview the application questions.
Applications will be assessed against the following criteria:
- Impact: on archive and users
- Delivery and management
- Knowledge sharing
The assessment criteria are the same as our engagement grants so please refer to the engagement grants assessment criteria webpage for further guidance.
Each application will be scored numerically against the criteria above, according to the following scale:
Score Rating
1 Poor
2 Low
3 Good
4 Excellent
5 Outstanding
Applications are assessed by a panel of archive and engagement experts from The National Archives.
Accessibility
We welcome and encourage applications from people of all backgrounds and are committed to making our application process accessible to everyone. This includes providing support, in the form of reasonable adjustments, for people who have a disability or a long-term condition and face barriers applying to us. You must contact us as early as possible in the application process.
We recommend contacting us at least 10 working days before the competition closing date, to ensure that we can provide you with the most suitable support possible. For accessibility enquiries, please contact jonathan.ladd@nationalarchives.gov.uk.