How to apply

• About your organisation: charity or company number; total income for the last financial year; number of trustees and non-executive directors; date established; website and social media accounts.
• What you would like Esmée to support: briefly outline how our funding and support will be used.

The questions will be about your work and how it meets our criteria for the programme.

Your answers are meant to be short. You can type your responses into the form, or upload a voice recording or video. Find guides on uploading a recording on our support page.

You’ll have a total of 750 words to answer all 3 questions (if uploading a voice or audio recording, this is usually around 5 minutes of speaking).

1. How is your work led by and shaped by young people from communities currently under-represented in arts and culture?
2. In what ways do you prioritise the joy and care of young people?
3. How is arts and creativity used in your work to influence change?

We’re interested in understanding the need your work will address, and the opportunities your organisation or partnership is uniquely placed to take.

We will also look at your website and social media to learn about your organisation. We suggest you use this space to focus on the change you want to achieve.

After you submit your Expression of Interest, you will be redirected to a Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) monitoring form. You will need to complete this for your organisation. Download a sample DEI monitoring form.

We will use this information to make sure that the reach of our funding and our funding practices are fair and just. We will also use it to help us identify and address structural inequity. Learn more about how we're classifying our data.

If you are ready, you can submit your Expression of Interest using this link.

The closing date for Expressions of Interest is 5pm on 15 March 2024.

We will get back to you in early May about your Expression of Interest.

Your Expression of Interest will be assessed using criteria based on the aims of the Youth-led Creativity Programme.

This process will be led by the Involving Young People Collective. A panel including members of the Collective and Esmée staff will select a longlist of applications to invite to the next stage.

If we cannot invite you to the next stage, we will offer feedback. We hope the feedback will be helpful.

We’ll ask you to submit some information about your work:

• Financial information about your organisation: financial details of the previous financial year, the current financial year, and the next financial year. The current year and next year should be based on your organisational income & expenditure budget.
• Diversity, Equity and Inclusion: Your organisation’s approach within your organisation and through your work.
• Outcomes: Up to three outcomes you expect from the work, and what your indicators of progress might be. These should contribute to Esmée’s aims for the programme. See our guidance on outcomes for more information.
• Supporting documents:
  • A copy of your latest approved annual report and accounts
  • An income and expenditure budget for the organisation for the current financial year
  • A copy of your safeguarding policy (see our approach to safeguarding)
  • A set of draft or management accounts covering the last financial year if you do not yet have an audited version (if applicable)
  • If you are applying for a project, a budget identifying what you would like us to fund and any other funding approached/secured
  • A copy of your Constitution, Memorandum and Articles of Association or other rules (if you are not a registered charity)

We want to have a conversation with you to learn more about your plans. You can see the points the conversation will cover below. This could be a phone or video call with a member of Esmée staff and a member of our Involving Young People Collective. You can have more than one person on the call but to make the most of the time, we suggest you have no more than three people. We expect the call to take approximately 60 minutes.

If you would prefer, you can ask to do this part by sending us written information. This could be a document you already have like a strategic plan or business plan; or an email with your responses to the points. The information you send us will be looked at by a member of Esmée staff and a member of our Involving Young People Collective.

The conversation will cover:

• Fit to our aims for youth-led creativity: Your work, the change you hope to achieve and how you plan to achieve it. As part of this, we want to understand:
  • What will be delivered.
  • More about the expected outcomes for your work.
  • Your approach to the care and wellbeing of young people.
  • What potential pathways there are for young people to progress their practice.
  • How you compensate young people contributing to and leading the work.
  • How you celebrate and bring joy into the process of creativity.
  • The role of adults and the intergenerational dynamics in your work.
  • Any risks you have identified: for instance, is the work new and untested? And how does the potential impact balance any risks?
• Track record: Your organisation, influence, and impact to date.
  • Talk through examples of your creative projects and impact to date.
  • How do you evaluate your work to understand the impact it is having.
• Your approach and how you work:
  • Who you work with, your appetite for collaboration, and how you share your work with others.
  • Your approach to learning and how you act on it.
  • More about your approach to diversity, equity and inclusion. We are interested in hearing about current challenges and any changes you are looking to make.

• The Written part should be sent off to us by 31 May.
• The Second part will take place in June.