Congratulations to our 2019 Southeastern Leadership Roundtable Civic Ignition Grant Winners! We received 10 submissions and had over 50 participants join us to judge the cycle at our meet up and workshop.  It was a great conversation and the workshop took about 90 minutes to complete. Thank you to all of our applicants and participants for an engaged civic impact experience.

This was also the first Civic Ignition Regional Grant where regional matching donations have exceeded the amount of the initial grant! Special thank you to Love Burn for a matching grant of $1,500 and Burnt Oranges for an additional $400. By generously donating these matching grants we were able to stretch this Civic Ignition round even further and grant more than double the initial grant of $1,500.

Congratulations to the grant recipients:

H.E.R Shelter Mural

The H.E.R. Shelter is a non profit organization that takes in women and children that have left abusive situations and need a safe place to stay while they navigate their new lives. There is a fenced in outdoor area that serves as a play space for the kids and a meditative space for the women. Unfortunately, it’s not the brightest place to be. The fence is functional but could definitely use brightening up. Our mission is to paint a mural that begins on one side of the fence as a rocky mountain range with a difficult to navigate path that slowly evens out to a flower-covered field, then to a breezy beach and then a smooth sailing ship. The thought is that the mural will be a reminder to these courageous women that though they may be having a difficult time now, they are one step closer to safety and security. We will outline the project onto the fence using a projector and then have the women and children at the shelter help to paint it. The projected project date is May 1.

Clear Creek Community Food Forest

This is the continuation and expansion of a project in which an acre of degraded land is being regenerated into a food-productive space for humans and wildlife utilizing food forest design, regenerative agriculture, and permaculture design methods. We would like to host action days, one in June and one in July, to provide a boost of energy and focus to this community food forest project that was started back in 2015 when the full-scale comprehensive map and initial earthworks were completed, along with 100+ trees, shrubs and herbs planted by more than 50 people in the community. Joana and myself (Michael) will organize promotional material, tools, food, entertainment (music in the garden!), educational workshops, organic resources and other facets necessary to empower people, skilled and unskilled, to contribute to what will be an exciting day of hands-on learning and the creation of a food forest that will provide for community members in one of the poorest counties in the country and one lacking in readily-available nutritious food, Rockcastle county in Kentucky.

In May 2019, we will bring together literacy, the arts, and environmental stewardship to shine a spotlight on the importance of literacy and the unique vibrancy of our local ecosystem. The purpose of this event is to showcase the work of community partners aligned with our Moonshot Moment goal of 90% literacy by third grade and to highlight the many ways we can care for our local ecosystem. Literacy and environmental education are intrinsically intertwined, and this is a collaborative effort that will be a powerful example of how we can spark our community into action. We will complete and unveil a collaboratively created Moonshot Mural at the main library in downtown Vero Beach, FL. This mural will be the result of collecting student work over a few months, then designing a mural that represents the students work in a cohesive way (think Keith Haring mural in Chicago). The artwork will be created in response to stories related to the issues facing our lagoon, so the idea is that the mural will be a representation of this important part of our community and how the students see it. The day overall will be anchored by a lovely story, Mermaid Meg and the Magic Lagoon about the Indian River Lagoon, our local estuary. We are bringing together a number of organizations with an environmental education focus. Each participating environmental organization will have a hands-on activity that poses a question or a challenge, tied to the points made in the story. We want to ask participants: What can YOU do? This will be a family event, engaging the community across generations.

Hearing Protection for Kids Workshop (757 Makerspace in Norfolk, VA)

We attract a high percentage of non-traditional and those on the spectrum to our classes and workshops, but lack over the ear hearing protection to help accommodate their needs. We are seeking over the head earmuff hearing protection for use around heavy equipment and loud sounds. We will be using high visibility, easy to recognize units with an NRR rating of 30 or higher. These will be placed in a dedicated area and hung on a colored peg board to make access and accountability quick and easy.

Girl Makers Club: Fearless with Electronics

What is the Southeastern Leadership Roundtable Civic Ignition Grant?
A program aimed at funding innovative community & civic projects within the Southeastern Leadership Roundtables respective geographic areas.  We are interested in programs that create collaborations, produce direct actions, utilize several of the 10 Burning Man Principles, are reproducible, and creatively tackle local social problems. This grant gives anyone the opportunity to submit a collaborative, creative, and principle-focused project with a chance to win up to a $,1,500 grant.

Timeline:
–  Grant Opportunity is announced on February 28th.
–  Deadline for grant submissions is April 1st (Midnight PST)
–  Workshop Participants will review the grant proposals at the 2019 Southeastern Leadership Roundtable (Weekend of April 5th)
–  Winner(s) will be announced Monday evening after the SERT  (April 8th)

Apply here: https://bit.ly/2BWROu2

What’s special about the Southeastern Leadership Roundtable Civic Ignition Grant?
Submissions to the 2019 Southeastern Leadership Roundtable Civic Ignition grant cycle will be workshopped and judged by a group of participants and community leaders that attend this year’s Southeastern Leadership Roundtable. This group will be using the submissions as material to review and workshop while learning how to administer their own civic grant programs.

Who is eligible to apply?
Anyone!  Individuals, Groups, and Not-for-Profits are all eligible.  You do not need to be a participant of the leadership gatherings themselves to apply.

How much can you ask for?
The maximum grant that maybe awarded is between $1,500.  We encourage your project’s viability to not be solely dependent on this grant.  Think about other sources of funding that might be available. Grants awarded could be less than the full amount.

What types of proposals will likely not get funded by this program?
Programs that are solely based on artistic endeavors and do not have a community or civic aspect will most likely not be considered for funding.  Funds should not be used for direct fundraising, chapter promotion efforts, or for paying people for their work.

What follow-up will be expected by grant recipients?
All recipients will be expected to submit written reports on what they have accomplished and learned in the course of their projects, along with accompanying visual media.  This media will be hosted on the Burners Without Borders website.

Suggestions for a quality grant proposal:
– Look at the BWB Grant Impact & Criteria Document to see how we think about grants.
– Reach out to your local Burning Man Regional Contact and ask if they might be an advisor.
– Watch our video “How to write Quality Grants: Burning Man 101”
(Starts rough but gets going at (9:00 in)
– Listen to our podcast  “Targeted Grant Writing: with Meta-Regional Jacqui Latendresse”

Who won the Civic Ignition Grant in 2018?                                                                                      
This will be our second time producing the Southeastern Leadership Roundtable Civic Ignition grant.
You can check out last years winners here.

Photos from the SERT 2018 Civic Ignition Grant Workshop

> How to create a Project.