The Allen Lane Foundation makes grants for up to three years, with a total value of £500-£15,000, although the average grant size last year was just over £5,900. The Foundation makes single grants, or grants for two or three years. Grants repeated for more than one year vary from about £500 per annum up to £5,000 per annum, for a maximum of three years. Funding is focused on a number of specific beneficiary groups and grants are made across the UK.
The Foundation focuses on work which:
- will make a lasting difference to people’s lives rather than simply alleviating the symptoms or current problems
- is aimed at reducing isolation, stigma and discrimination, and
- encourages or enables unpopular groups to share in the life of the whole community.
While recognising (and being willing to support) on-going, tried and tested projects, the Foundation is particularly interested in unusual, imaginative or pioneering projects which have perhaps not yet caught the public imagination.
The Foundation is interested in funding work which benefits people in the following groups, or generalist work which includes significant numbers from more than one such group:
- Asylum-seekers and refugees (but not groups working with a single nationality)
- Gay, lesbian, bi-sexual or transgender people
- Gypsies and Travellers
- Migrant workers
- Offenders and ex-offenders
- Older people
- People experiencing mental health problems
- People experiencing violence or abuse
If the beneficiaries of your work do not include a significant proportion of people from one or more of these groups it is unlikely that your application will be successful
Activities
Some examples of the kind of activities which might be suitable for funding
- Provision of advice or information
- Advocacy
- Arts activities where the primary purpose is therapeutic or social
- Befriending or mentoring
- Mediation or conflict resolution
- Practical work, such as gardening or recycling, which benefits both the provider and the recipient
- Self-help groups
- Social activities or drop-in centres
- Strengthening the rights of particular groups and enabling their views and experiences to be heard by policy-makers
- Research and education aimed at changing public attitudes or policy
- Work aimed at combating stigma or discrimination
- Work developing practical alternatives to violence
Type of Grants
The Foundation makes grants for start-up, core or project costs. These grants are relatively small. Examples of types of grants we make could be
- Volunteers or participants expenses
- Venue hire
- Part-time or sessional staffing costs
- Work aimed at strengthening the organisation such as trustee or staff training
Please see the guidelines for more details of the criteria and how to apply or follow this link for more information. (There are no deadlines – applications can be submitted at any time.)
