New Grants Announced!

A new round of the Records Access Documentation grants for organisations to document records relating to care leavers will open in October. Successful projects will be funded to $15 000.

The grants are being funded as part of the National Find and Connect services, to support eligible organisations to describe records relating to children living in ‘care’ during the 1920s-1980s. The purpose is to improve access for past care-leavers to records that have not yet been properly documented.

At the end of the projects, information about the records (not the records themselves) will be included on the Find & Connect website to assist Care Leavers and support services in finding out what documents exist and where they can be found. This will cut back on time and frustration spent trying to trace important records.

The RAD2 Grants Round has taken on feedback from the previous grants round in 2012 and made the application process easier and simpler. Applications will be online and will be open for longer. There is also a project officer based in the Find and Connect web resource team to help out along the way.

Workshops will be held around the country during the application period to discuss potential projects and help records holders decide if they want to apply.  We’ll also be hosting webinars as support for those who can’t attend a workshop in person.   Further workshops will be held in 2017 for successful grant applicants. If you’re interested in attending a workshop later this year, let us know by contacting rad-2@unimelb.edu.au. We’ll go where there’s the greatest demand, so don’t forget to get in touch! For places we can’t get to, we’ll run webinars, so no-one will miss out.

We’ll keep you updated on the blog as the workshops are scheduled and grant applications open. All the grant information will be available from the Find and Connect web resource once the application period opens.