Call for Applications: Opening Access to the Heritage & Education Centre

Closing Date: 9 February 2018

1. Rationale

The Lloyd’s Register Foundation is a UK charity established in 2012. With our mission to protect the safety of life and property, and to advance transport and engineering education and research, the Foundation has an important role to play in meeting the challenges of today and the future.

The Lloyd’s Register Foundation Heritage & Education Centre (HEC) holds a unique archive and library spanning the operation of Lloyd’s Register since it was founded in 1760. Much of our archive material dates from 1834, when Lloyd’s Register was reconstituted.

The HEC collection is varied but is one of the great resources still available for current and historic information concerning maritime history, marine engineering, naval architecture, offshore engineering and ocean technology. It contains General Committee Minutes, Surveyors Committee Reports, Registers of Ships and Yachts, letter books, ship plans and survey reports (currently being catalogued, conserved and digitised as part of Project Undaunted) and many other treasures.

Further introductory information can be found here.

HEC is committed to providing opportunities for researchers from universities, museums and libraries to work with its unique archive and library, to enhance public understanding of maritime history and technology and the impact this has on contemporary issues.

This call supports the Foundation’s current strategy and five year plan, which includes putting the Lloyd’s Register archive collection to work in pursuit of the education, public understanding and research elements of our strategy.

2. The Goal and Scope of the Scheme

This scheme has been established to help the Foundation improve access to our archive and collections for research and education purposes, and to inspire the next generation into science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics (STE(A)M) related subjects. The primary goal of the scheme is to support researchers to enhance public understanding of maritime history, technology and safety, by using the Heritage & Education Centre collections, (either independently or enriched by context of other collections), focussing on our 4 research themes.

Development of ship and yacht building since the 1800s Impact of maritime sector on world trade and trade routes Safety at sea Depiction of maritime technology in art

The Foundation will support a limited number of high calibre research programmes. It is envisaged that the programmes will be short and small scale, with a potential to develop into larger projects. Funding will be awarded at a maximum of £5,000 for 3 months or £10,000 for 6 months and will support costs related to the project such as travel, attendance at conferences and associated costs, but will not fund salaries.

3. Eligibility Criteria

Lloyd’s Register Foundation does not fund individuals, but this call will welcome applications from project leaders within academia, museums, archives and libraries. Applicants must have already demonstrated high quality research with previous experience of project leadership.

In order to be considered eligible, a proposal must also satisfy the following criteria:

Applications must be received by 17:00 GMT on the 5 January 2018. Please note that applications received after this time will not be considered.

Applications are required to clearly demonstrate that the proposed work will contribute to increase public understanding of maritime technology and safety on past, present and future.

Full terms and conditions will be agreed in the grant contract. Also see who and what we fund.

4. Evaluation Criteria

Applications for the Opening access to the Heritage & Education Centre scheme will be independently peer reviewed. Applications will be assessed against the following criteria:

potential for significant impact (including achievability) against the Foundation’s charitable aim of enhancing the safety of life and property and advancing public education

feasibility of research proposal

whether there is a significant unique contribution to maritime history and understanding of safety through the research proposal

5. Timings

Successful applicants will be notified by email in March 2018. If you do not receive an email from us by this time, then please consider your application has been unsuccessful on this occasion.

We anticipate that the disbursement of grants will commence towards the end of April 2018, we will provide further information to the successful applicants.

6. How to apply

Proposals should be submitted using the online application process here using the specific form, and supported by supplementary material as requested. The following must be submitted in the application:

Proposals requiring funding in excess of the £10,000 limit must be supported by additional justification.

An explanation as to why funding from other sources is unavailable.

A cost breakdown estimate

CV of the principal applicant

Letter of support from your organisation

7. Contact

For more information, please contact Victoria Culkin at victoria.culkin@lrfoundation.org.uk, quoting “HEC Opening Access Call” in the subject line.