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Ecological Opportunities Fund

(This grant is temporarily closed)

Background

The British Ecological Society was the first national ecological society and has been an invaluable resource for ecologists in Britain and worldwide since 1913.  The BES has numerous specific funding schemes to support the charitable objectives of the Society. The Society is careful to ensure that applications to particular schemes conform to the requirements of that scheme. From time-to-time the BES receives interesting requests for financial help from individuals and organisations that would clearly benefit the careers of young ecologists or the science of ecology, but these have traditionally fallen outside any of the current funding schemes. To deal with these innovative requests, the BES has launched the ‘Ecological Opportunities Fund’ (EOF) capable of supporting any significant and worth-while proposal that clearly lies within the remit of the Society.

Objective

The Ecological Opportunities Fund will support applications that clearly advance the strategic aims of the society and which currently fall outside the remit of the existing grant schemes. Applications will need to significantly contribute to one or more of the following BES strategic aims:

The Society's mission is: To promote the science of ecology worldwide

Scope

The BES has committed £100,000 a year until further notice to fund approaches to the BES that fall outside the current remit of the existing Grants Portfolio, and other funding streams but that clearly will contribute to the strategic aims of the society.  Applications can be from any country, though BES members will get prioritised funding if competition is high. There are no maximum or minimum funding restrictions however funding will be for a fixed period of not more than five years with no open-ended applications for funding being considered.

Projects the Fund will support

Proposals that clearly show how they will further the charitable remit of the Society in a cost effective manner, in particular applications that show how they will significantly advance the science of ecology, novel collaboration between the science of ecology and other disciplines for example by the creation of knowledge, the valuable synthesis of existing knowledge, novel collaboration between science of ecology and other disciplines or the nurturing of careers in ecology, are encouraged. Evidence of co-funding is advantageous.

Examples of applications we have funded under this scheme to date are:

• The National Cataloguing Unit For the Archives of Contemporary Scientists - £6,000 to process one of the smaller components of the programme to catalogue archives of five major figures in ecology and nature conservation in Britain and internationally. Archiving will start with Professor Arthur Willis.
• Cambridge Universities Darwin Correspondence Project - £20,000 for three years to support the creation of a dedicated "Darwin and ecological science" section of the Darwin Correspondence Project website.

Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge. £65,736 for the development of a conservation evidence database -Summarising published research, collating unpublished material and translating paper abstracts into English for www.conservationevidence.com. Two years salary for Project Officer.

• ECOCEAN Whale Shark Photo-identification Library (http://www.whaleshark.org). £9,979 towards a migration to an open source, scalable database, application of 3D models for improved pattern-recognition, and distributed computing for scalability and processor-intensive analysis.

  Projects the Fund will not support

  Briefly, this fund will NOT make awards towards fees for higher degrees, or deal with any application that is eligible for any of the other existing BES funding schemes.

  This grant will not fund publication page charges.

  The EOF will not fund applications that have been refused funding by the BES for essentially the same project. Exceptions to the case would be where the application failed because it fell outside the remit of the rest of the BES Grants portfolio.

  Applicants should note that the focus of the EOF is ecological science. (the study of the distribution and abundance of organisms and the functions of ecosystems).

  The Fund will not be open to applications that fall outside the charitable remit of the Society.

  Application procedure and Deadline

  Please complete a Gender and Ethnic monitoring form and a 3 page (maximum) outline application in which you:

  1. Clearly state what it is you or your organisation wishes to do.

  2. Include, (if appropriate), a short cv, and supporting letter from the head of your organisation.

3. Please mention what major opportunities will be lost if the proposal is not funded and what real difference will the work be expected to have made when completed.

4. Provide an explanation of why other possible funding streams are inappropriate, or simply not available or, if the application is for part funding, where the rest of the money would come from.

5. Present a short but informative budget with accompanying justifications.

6. Summarise how the results/outcomes will be disseminated.

For modest sums of money, (less than £3000), the short, outline application may be sufficient to make a decision on whether to fund an application or not. However for sums larger than £3000 the BES reserves the right to ask for a longer proposal focussing on points requiring clarification, and in some cases external referees or Senior members of the society may be brought in for their advice on the funding proposal.

Applications should be emailed to the grants department at the British Ecological Society .

Deadline: Temprarily closed

Contact information

Please contact Grants with any questions regarding the Ecological Opportunities Fund.

Related Information:

• BES Strategic Plan
• BES General Grant Guidelines
• BES Current Grants Portfolio
• BES List of other funders

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