The grant aims at celebrating those who contribute to making a positive change in the society by using a creative approach. Indeed, these courageous citizens’ actions can inspire the creation of new models and policies that can be applied on a local, regional or European scale. Through this grant, ECF wants to support individuals and organisations who acknowledge, in their everyday life, the various positive impacts that culture has on the society.

The grant offers financial support to ideas, which are not entirely developed yet but have the potential to become concrete projects. Through “Idea Incubator workshops”, ECF will provide the beneficiaries with the opportunity to receive professional advice on how to develop their ideas as well as allowing them to exchange with other participants. To be selected, the ideas should be based on bold and innovative concepts. A special focus is also made on ideas promoting values such as inclusiveness, solidarity or equality.

The application is opened to organisations or individuals from the private, public or civil sector, who have a good command of English and who are not already beneficiaries of any ECF funds during the same funding period. Candidates should be over 18 years old and be based or active in EU/EFTA members states, EU candidate and potential candidate countries, and/or countries in the wider European neighbourhood (an exhaustive list of eligible countries can be found here). The application must be submitted in English and the idea should be a new concept and not the concretisation of an already existing project.

The application is made online through the following link and must be submitted before 9 May 2018 at 18:00 CET. To apply, candidates are required to fill in an online form by answering ten questions about their ideas. 30 grants of maximum 10.000 EUR each will be allocated, for a 14-month funding period. Successful candidates will be notified in July 2018.

More information is available on the official  call for application.