So a few key things that I wanted to start with, with this program. For those of you who and I think, you know, one of the the the biggest things of grant programs is it’s like oh my gosh there’s Maddie quick, you know, let’s let’s apply for this’ but it is so important that you actually do complete, your project plan. Now after this session and if you’re watching the recording this is also available at the bottom of the page. After the session I’m going to send each of you an email and you’re going to have a draft what I call the project planning canvas and I’m also going to give you a help sheet to help you, in particular with f r r r’s budget. If you’re not familiar with it, it is slightly different. So I’ve done a little cheat sheet that’s going to help you with that. So I’m going to email those out to you, and if you’re watching the recording it’s just underneath and you’re able to to download that. So it is really important that you think about what your project is.

Now seeds of renewal program has been going for quite a long time, and the ANZ have partnered with FRRR to bring this as I said to what or as I said to regional, rural and remote communities and and it is very much focused on, looking at how that you can build a sustainable community. So that can be, you know, strengthening what you already have and it could could be creating opportunities to do things that certainly deliver medium to long term economic benefit to the community, and that contribute to economic sustainability and I think that’s the key thing with this one is just to remember who the funder is. The funder is a bank and of course that economic piece for them is actually quite important. You know their premise and and this is just a statement as a as a grant writer and assessor. I don’t know any inside information I can assure you but when I look at a funder like this I look at what’s their motivation for supporting a grant program and being a bank in this case they certainly have a real motivation to make sure that a community is strengthened through economic impacts. So, you know, economic benefit back to the community. So really make sure that that you have that lens when you think about your projects. If you’ve already planned your projects, and you’ve worked out, you know, what benefits it delivers, so those outcomes that your project is delivering, go back and have a look and make sure that that you’ve got those economic benefits and those economic outcomes in your project plan.

That is really important if, you haven’t already done so. If you haven’t already identified it then you’ll actually need to think about how you’re going to to measure that, and, you know, monitor those those impacts through the program. One of the great things about actually going on to the website and I’ve got the website the FRRR website up in front of me Seeds of ANZ, Seeds of Renewal and I’ll just pop that link, again we’ll pop that down, the bottom for those watching the recording and it’s in chat now for those joining us live. One of the the great things about, grant programs that have happened in the past is you’re able to get a sense for what sorts of programs the funder has funded before and you can see here, and I’ll just visually describe this just in case we do have people listening in, or that do have a visual impairment. On the page you’ll actually be able to find, previous rounds it’s called and there are links to the different years and the types of projects and programs they’ve supported. That’s really useful information because it gives you a sense for what, not necessarily what they prefer. It’s not about a preference but it’s the types of projects. So what sorts of things do they do they focus on? You know, what sorts of community projects do they they believe are demonstrate that economic benefit? So, you know, feel free to have a look at those noting that from year to year funders do change of focus.

So it’s it’s just interesting information. Don’t be guided by it at all, but it’s interesting information for you. So let’s have a look down further on the page. You will find, there are three tabs on the page. One is called program guidelines and there’s a raft of information there, and then there’s some information to help you when you’re actually gathering gathering information for your application. So I really strongly recommend that you look at this and then the third tab is the ‘apply now’ and there’s some some useful resources. So as I mentioned we will be going through the program guidelines and application form. For those of you who have never applied to FRRR before, there’s also a very useful how to guide to navigate their grant, application online system.

One of the things that I always recommend people do when they found, a grant that suits them is make sure that you are eligible tax status eligibility. It’s kind of like, you know, if you like the first gate that decision gate that you need to get through because if you’re not eligible you know you certainly won’t be able to apply or if you do apply you’ve, you know, wasted a lot of your time, which is not what we want to happen. So once you’ve found a grant program that is of interest you should download what I call the application kit. Now that is the guidelines, the application form and anything else that they have mentioned in their guidelines and their application form. It could be related for example to a policy. There is one in the FRRR’s instance which I’ll show you a little later which is called an activity tree. So I’ll get to that and show you that in a moment. But the other thing that I really seriously recommend that you do, read.

It may be duplicate information but there might be one or two things that have been added in that aren’t in the guidelines and that is any information on the page. So in this case, for this grant program there are some drop down boxes, for example, what are the program objectives and it goes through the program objectives which I will come back to. Now you certainly in this case I have checked and you will find that in the guidelines. There’s a couple of other points as well but there is one, one aspect here that’s not in the guidelines which is the volunteering opportunity. So please make sure you do read that. I’ll come back to that in a moment as well. So, definitely read anything that the funder has, on their website. I picked up something the other week on a grant program that was in their FAQs but wasn’t anywhere else in the documentation that said, you know if you submit a risk management plan your application will be deemed more favorable.

Like wow big news that wasn’t anywhere else. So you know really make sure that you do think of what’s on their website as part of the guidelines. As I said, it might be duplicate information it doesn’t necessarily hurt because it means you’re hearing the same strong messages again but, but it could also be new information as well. So in saying that, let’s go on and have a look at the guidelines and I’m watching chat as well so please feel free as we go through, I’m just going to, stop sharing this page. Please feel free as we go through, ask any questions, relating to this. So let me just bring up this screen. So what we’re we’re looking at here is the program guidelines, you know, does close on the August 11, big hot tip plan, for it to close on the August 9, and give yourself a little bit of leeway. We all know we’re grant writers things crop up and things happen don’t they? So give yourself plenty of time.

You don’t want to get to the end of the hour or those, hopefully it hasn’t happened to you but I certainly know people it has happened to leaving it too late and and hitting submit right on time and just missing out. Particularly that this is regional, rural, remote. We all know that, that sometimes funny things can happen with our data so we want to make sure you get that in in on time. And a note for those who are in, Western Australia joining us and from other, I think we’ve got some some, someone from Taz, or in Tasmania at the moment, I should say not from, but in Tasmania at the moment and, from anyone else watching the recording from another state this is Victorian time the close time. So I always recommend when you’re going through guidelines that you actually have your own checklist and so this is what I would do if, for example, I was in WA. I would actually note the date and I would note that it’s actually closing at 3PM because there’s a currently a two hour time difference between AEST and AWST and I’d actually note that that closes at 3PM on that date WA time. So, it is important as one of the things that we do with with different states it is important to make sure that we know that is that time that close time is it, you know our local state time or is it is it their time. Always assume that it’s their time and double check, with them as well.

It doesn’t hurt. So you will put that down on your guidelines checklist. There is some information about FRRR which is is, useful to get a sense if you again if you haven’t been exposed to them before. You know that the focus here is, you you know, their programs really focus on ensuring the social and economic strength of remote, rural and regional communities and, you know, certainly seeds of renewal, very, very well aligns to that purpose. So there’s a couple of things that we should be really, really clear on. We should be really clear on why are they giving out funding. I mean, yes, I know there are very, you know, good hearted well meaning people out there but at the end of the day they have to achieve a purpose. You know there’s something that’s driving them, that’s motivating them.

This one in particular is about I’m just going to highlight some, highlight to you some words here. I can’t highlight them on screen so I’m just going to read out these words, to you in particular. I might be able to highlight here we go, is designed to help build vibrant and sustainable rural communities and it’s about ensuring the ongoing prosperity, of Regional Australia. So, you know, when we think about, think about this program in particular, you’ll see that vibrant communities and sustainable communities. So when we think about vibrant communities, the way that this is described to us is that it’s about diversity and inclusiveness with strong social capital where everyone can participate to build a better life. Now if I was reflecting on that and reflecting on my grant program I would actually be saying well how does what I’m asking them to fund in this program, how does it actually include everyone? So what does that look like? Look some programs that you might apply for of course they’re specifically for your group or your organisation but do think, you know, this will actually give it a lot more strength when you consider let’s just say you’re a club or a community group you’re actually going to get a lot more strength in your submission if you’re partnering with others to have broader impact, and that one of the key things about this program and this is an example of something I’m just going to, to swap screens back to the website because I do want to show you something in particular that, that has been mentioned. Here we go. In this information, here we go and I’ll just zoom in a little bit here as well so that everyone, those of you who are watching the screen and able to see it are able to see this.

One of the particular things about this program is that the program and they’ve, they’ve been very upfront with this. It typically funds one project per region. So in essence what they’re wanting to do is they’re wanting to have a program that does have a broad impact and so if we come back to that vibrant community statement, this is this is really about making sure that when you’re considering what you’re applying for funding for that it broadly is looking at your community, not necessarily your region although if what you’re doing has a broader approach then fantastic. It’s definitely an opportunity to make sure that they are aware of that. But certainly think about your community as a broader approach. So, I’ve just had a question and in this case Sasha has asked this and I’ll say that because Sasha certainly put this question to everybody in the chat box. If you would like to ask me something privately and confidentially, please then just direct it to me and, and I’ll make sure that I address that. So in this case, Sasha said ‘does the region mean the Riverina or is it smaller like Shires?’ When I say region I think about when, you know, think about a benchmark.

So when we talk region we talk regional organisations. So those regional organisations typically cover a region which is in this case the Riverina Region. We’ve got some WA people there and and, great to see you on on screen there. Hello! And so, in that case for WA what they’re looking at is the Great Southern Region. So that’s an example when we talk regional. So local is your local community or LGA because some communities are LGA, but generally speaking when we talk about remote regional and rural communities, we have an LGA but then we have a region and our local government area might consist of a couple of different regions or it might be a town with a lot of villages that surround it, and then you’ll have the the next layer which is your region and then we have state. So the region is that, that encapsulates quite a few local government areas. So just think about that when you’re when you’re looking at your project is how could you build strength? You know one of the the things about, grant programs and if you’re watching this and you haven’t done any of the grant courses, you know you’ll find these on our iClick2Learn membership, and one if you know, you’ll find a lot of information that’ll help you with this but just to mention that for those of you who maybe haven’t is your job as a grant applicant is to build a strong case and so these are, you know, when you think about guidelines I’m always looking, you know, as an applicant and assessor myself, I’m always looking for those stronger points that the things that they mention that I know if I do consider this and I think about how I could do that without changing the quality of what you’re offering and that’s really important.

We don’t just add something on to make sure the funder, you know, add something on because we think it’s going to be great that the funder will love. It has to be a really authentic addition to strengthen your project and so this is where you know real strategy comes in when you’re applying. So if I was wanting to do a local community project and and it was just for my club or my community group or a group of people then, you know, for those that have got a project like this I would strongly recommend that you consider how you can actually broaden your impact. It might be that you’re working with a similar group in another local government area across that region. So hopefully that gives you a a couple of, a couple of ideas. Yeah. So great. And you can see here that I’ll just highlight these areas as well.

You can see here that, there’s a couple of other points now interestingly, when we talk about these funding areas, this is why I needed to go to the website. Another great example of when there’s funding always always consider that what they put on their website is part of their guidelines even if it isn’t in their guidelines. And, and I could be wrong because I I did do a search for this and those words, we might find this in the guidelines later on but I couldn’t find this in my initial read through. So really important point, you know for everybody that does help build a stronger case. So, there are some key things there that they’re looking for. Demonstrate medium to long term benefits. So again think about that. You might be doing a project that that is to do this but think about what the ripple effect is and make sure that that comes across in your submission in the questions which we will look at.

And again this just further strengthens that, you know, what they are looking at is a project that delivers a lot of impact and that’s projects that benefit a large number of people from a diverse range of social groups. So diversity for some of you in some community areas may be diversity of the population and age group and cultural background for example but, you know, from groups so a diverse range of different groups and of course that projects that encourage inclusion and participation of our underrepresented groups or marginalized groups. So do make sure that you factor those in when you factor how could we build a stronger project that, that funders will be able to, you know, to say ‘Yeah this is actually a great project for the region’. So co contributions we will get to in a moment. Let’s head back to our guidelines now. So hopefully this information has been valuable already, for those of you who’ve only, only just started looking at the the guidelines and this section here, the vibrant communities guidelines. So so we’ve only only just really started looking at this part. So vibrant communities, diverse and inclusive with strong social capital, again where everyone can participate and build a better life.

So the next part of this is our sustainable communities. So the, the program is built pretty much on those two. They’ve called it tenants, you know, think of them as priorities. These are the two key things for them. Well they’re not even priorities, they’re sort of like the foundation if you like. You know these are foundations of this grant program. So the other one is sustainable communities and so this is about definitely, how you innovate, how you expand, how you create opportunities, you know how do we make sure that when we’re looking at it and our, you know, what we’re delivering or our group or what we’re doing that we’re able to say that this project is actually going to be sustainable. You know there are a lot of projects that are what I would call sort of one hit wonders.

We’re going to and I’ll give you just a simple example we’re going to deliver a webinar or a workshop. Let’s just use this example but it’s you know think about ‘yes but what do we do in that webinar or workshop? What are the outcomes and how do we make those outcomes sustainable?’ And so in this case again what we have is we have that economic lens. So making sure that we focus on how does our project and what we’re proposing deliver and this is an important one demonstrable. So in other words, you’re going to have to be able to demonstrate this. When you think about demonstrating things think stories and stats. So how do you how are you going to be able to demonstrate this through case studies or through surveys and stats? Those medium to long term economic benefits to the community and how they help contribute to, economic sustainability of the community. So, you know, it could be for example let’s just say, you know, we’re looking at how Hall thinks about its business model or thinks about how, you know, it’s going to cost out hiring etc. Well what does that look like? We’re looking at as an organisation around how we provide something to a community and we need start up money to be able to provide that, to to give it to the community at a lesser rate which is actually going to to increase, that sort of vibrant community but it’s also going to be sustainable because we will have a price point that they’ll have to pay for ongoing funds.

That’s just another random point that they’ll have to pay for ongoing funds. That’s just another random example. Hope those, hope those help you, you think through that. I’ll just check chat. Okay, wonderful. Yep, great. So the next thing that we go on to is the types of projects that we’re supporting. We have three key areas here, environmental sustainability with some examples and I’ll come back to some of those, financial well-being with the community and improving access to housing.

So there are three key areas that that we’re focusing on. So vibrant communities and sustainable communities are the very foundation of the grant program. This program, or this round is focusing on how your project improves environmental sustainability and I won’t go through this in detail because it certainly is there and we’ve we’ve still got the application form to look at, and improving financial well-being within the community and it’s great that, you know, FRRR has provided some examples for you and, again, examples could be I, I talked about when I showed you the website and we had those programs at FRRR, or the ANZ Seeds of Renewal program, I should say, what they have funded in previous years. So that’ll also give you some sort of insights as to what sort of projects they fund. And the other one is that improving access to housing. So they’ve also provided a couple of examples of what some of those, some of those past projects are there, that have done one, of those three areas. So again some really useful examples for you. But it is important that you do focus on this.

Now a hot tip that I would give you is is think about your project and think about where it fits. These are these are three very different priorities that they have. So we have environmental, we have financial and we have housing so three very distinctly different elements and what I would do let’s just say, the financial well-being what I would do is I would look at, this oh that’s not quite what I wanted to do there I would would look at the description that you can find underneath each of those priorities and, and I’ve just circled that in a yellow highlight for everybody but I’m going to undo that because I’m going to talk through through these as an example. One of the biggest common mistakes that applications make or applicants make is they tell funders information they think is irrelevant but actually doesn’t directly relate to the program or it doesn’t directly answer the question. So what you would do is you would look at your project and you would say, okay. How does my project improve financial well-being? Does my project involve any underrepresented people or does my project provide or include any, people that are identified as disadvantaged in our community? And what I mean by our community is the area that you’re going to be providing. For example this financial well-being, training. We’ll use, you know, financial well-being training as a broad one.

It’s a fairly easy one as our example and then ask how does my project include initiatives that improve economic participation?’ And so the examples given here are building financial literacy, building vocational skills and providing access to meaningful work. So they’re three, you know, just examples that they’ve given or four was the three examples in this case that they’ve given. So you would say how does my project do this? And make sure that, you know, examples, that they’ve also given, four projects are underneath here. So building financial knowledge, supporting job readiness, providing better financial behaviors and decision making, financial confidence and well-being, assisting with financial goal setting and improving money management skills. So again just ask how does my project do this?’, what does my project do in this space?’ Now all of the other benefits that you have that your project has because I have so many other benefits the thing is that if you’re applying for a project and again we’re talking about vibrant communities, and sustainability that that helps do or address this this key, this second key priority, which is improving financial well-being, you need to make sure that the information you’re providing really focuses on that area. One of the the bigger frustrations I have as an Assessor when I see information coming through and it’s not just me, I have to say this is broadly whenever I’m doing grant training work on behalf of funders they’re always saying this to me Make sure people get the point to provide relevant information only. So there might be things that you think are really important but I have to say to you if you’ve got a project and you’re focusing on this priority, everything that you say, everything that you share about your outcomes, about what you’re going to measure, about the benefits, you know, anything that you share about your project really has to focus on this area. Don’t then start talking about something else that’s not directly related to how your project improves financial well-being.

The challenge is and I know we all know that our projects do so much but the challenge is that you’re now spending your words in an area that the funders simply can’t, when they’re assessing a question, give you points for. So really do focus on that in your application. We then move on to the guidelines, and you know you probably all perhaps aware of this already. Grants of up to $15,000 are available. So they do have a bigger pool but the maximum we can ask for is $15,000 and again you know they really do reinforce those elements that I showed you earlier which is a large number of people, inclusion and participation, a medium a demonstrable medium to long term benefit remember the focus is on that economic benefit and the co contributions which we’re definitely going to talk about in the budget. It’s really important co contributions to demonstrate and co contributions don’t just have to be cash they can be in kind. So we’ll talk a little bit more about that in a while. This, funder is also great really really clear on what grant funds can be used for.

So, you know, and they’ve said a broad range of charitable projects that aligned to the program are considered but there are several areas that they can’t fund. So make sure that when you’re asking for them to pay for things that it very clearly does not fall into any of these and I’ll just point out one for example we’re working with a language school on a project and one of the things that, in an application, that was asked was to put a thank you, gift in but if we were applying for this project we wouldn’t be able to put that in. If you put anything in your budget that you’re asking a funder to fund that they’ve clearly said they won’t fund, typically they’ll do one of two things. They’ll either reduce that, remove that from the budget and maybe they’ll give you, if they like your project and you you tick every other box, they may give you that funding and they’ll just remove that amount. Or, the other the other one to do is, that they might do is they might just say ‘Look, you know what? That’s a no’, because they haven’t followed, the process. Wonderful. Thanks Benita. So great to see you.

Thank you so much. I’m sorry I was testing our new system that’s why I had trouble with video. I’m sorry for the interruption everyone. I just didn’t want to bleed without saying goodbye.

That’s wonderful. And and there no doubt you’ll all see Benita. We’re, working with Benita on a a regional project, so we’ll have a lot of WA people joining us in, coming weeks and months. So so thanks for later.

We were just setting up the system for it. We finally got it all good. So thank you. We’ll see you again soon.

All right wonderful. See you soon. Great. So I’m just gonna check chat see if if there’s any other, any other thing in chat. No everyone is good. Okay, wonderful. I’ll keep, keep on then. And of course the eligibility, but that should be the first thing we check and the good thing is that, and I think we’re we’ve got, a lot of GD people on on now but certainly, we have other people are watching the recording, you know, sometimes that eligibility in this case, I’ll give you an example of eligibility.

This is for regional, rural and remote. So if you’re in an area that’s actually considered Greater Sydney then you wouldn’t be deemed to be eligible. So, you know, it’s certainly here, and I’ll just highlight that there. However, if your organisation is based in Greater Sydney but your project is actually about communities in remote, rural or regional Australia then of course you would be deemed eligible. So just make sure if you’ve got any questions F triple A staff are fabulous that you do give them a call and you do check on this because you don’t want to do all of this work and and find out that you’re not eligible so make sure that that you, that you do follow this. The other thing that that is really important and I always look for this, if funders bold things, if they underline things, if it’s a different colour or it’s in capitals etc, pay attention. What they’re trying to, you know, basically what they’re saying is we’ve seen this so many times that we keep saying this message but you know it’s still not getting through. You can see here in, in red, you may be able to see that if not I’ll just read out what it is.

It says please note you will be considered ineligible if and there’s a range of areas that that you’ll be considered ineligible one of the key ones of course is if you don’t provide the information that they’ve asked you for, or if, your application is incomplete. Very, very rarely do funders come back to you and say, oh, we really like your project. Can you actually provide us that document that, you know, we asked you for that you didn’t put in?’ Highly unlikely, very, very rarely as I say and, and certainly in this case, FRRR have been very clear that because of their number of applications that they receive, they’re, unlikely to follow-up any missing documentation. So, we’re about to head into the application form to have a look at that. The other thing that, that I want to point out, to you, and there is the ANZ volunteers. I did say I couldn’t couldn’t see that in the the read through early but there it is, it’s up on the screen which is fabulous. The other thing I want to share with you is that, you know think about opportunities, pardon me I need to sneeze. Oh dear.

Oh we’re on, I’m on a macadamia farm at the moment but I’m not allergic to macadamias. So So the other thing I want to show is the ANZ volunteers. So this is an opportunity and think about this as an opportunity. It’s certainly not something that will give you a greater, leverage in your application I have to say, but this is an opportunity for your organisation to connect with some skilled financial staff, or staff that are skilled in other areas. You know it might be process or policy. If there’s opportunities where ANZ volunteer staff can actually support your organisation. So really useful to think through that through. It’s not about counting on it, I wouldn’t plan for it in your project, but it’s an additional option if you’re thinking about your project or even at your organisation, if there’s opportunity for them to engage with you.

And look, if you do apply for this funding and you’re unsuccessful then I certainly still recommend you reach out if you’ve got an opportunity for, regional staff to help your organisation in any way, they’ve certainly, you know, they’re putting the call out through this program that they really want to make sure that they’re, they’re supporting regional, rural and remote communities so do do that, and then we come to the grants information which is great. So now let’s have a look at the application form. I don’t want to save those highlighted areas, wonderful. So when we have a look at the application form itself there’s a lot of kind of general information here about the organisation and ABN name and those sorts of things. Hopefully for many of you you should have a grants toolkit that actually addresses a lot of those, questions. If you don’t, you’ll find that in the library and just for those, that are watching live, you won’t be able to search that in the library today. That’ll actually be available next week but, it’ll be available in time for the recording. So the grants toolkit basically goes through those key things like who the organisations are, the website, the ABN, etc, and you’ve got that all in one central document that you can share.

The other thing that you should have in that central document which is really, really useful is always have a brief overview of your organisation. I’m just going to zoom in on these questions a little bit just to make it a little bit easier for everybody. A brief overview of your organisation. This is quite a broad kind of question, the great thing about FRRR, applications, they’re one of the funders that actually give you hints on what they expect to see in your response. So when you think about your response, to this question, they’re asking you for a brief overview of your organisation’s mission, any major programs or activities that you do, who if you’ve got facilities who uses your facilities, if you’re providing a service you know who’s accessing the service, if you can if you can actually paint a bit of a visual here for them that’s actually really useful. So, so describe them, visually, and of course any other engagement you’ve got with other community groups or key partnerships. You know, you could represent this as a figure, a statistic for example. X number of, of, community members are supporting or engaged in the project or X number of community groups or partners have been engaged in the project.

No. It’s a different it’s a different project and a and a different, yeah. The other one was an f TripleR 1. This one’s A and zed, but it’s still f triple We’re very hopeful that we may get that first one, but does that put us out of because we wouldn’t have it acquitted by the time this has to be in even if we well, we won’t know before this would have to be submitted. So

So one of the things that, a lot of funders don’t like is what they call double dipping. And so they don’t like that, you know, oh, okay, this organisation, we’ve got five different programs and this organisation’s applied for, you know one, two and three of those programs for example. So what I always say is make contact and confirm. The premise that I go with always is unless they say otherwise, unless you’ve been told otherwise, yes definitely apply for even if it’s the the same you know in some cases it can be exactly the same grant program and you can apply for two different projects. So, So really do think about that, you know when you’re thinking about applying generally. When we’re talking specifically about this FRRR one for you Gail, I would give them a call and I would just make sure. My, you know certainly from my perspective I’d say yeah definitely it’s a different project, it’s a different funding round. I don’t see any reason for you not to apply for this this project.

Exactly, exactly, exactly. And yeah Nicholas fabulous thanks for popping that in chat. That’s definitely one of the recommendations isn’t it? So the recommendation on the, the brief overview of your organisation in that grants toolkit you should have a response, and that response would vary with different word limits. So for example, I even have a 50 word response of an overview of our organisation, and a hundred word response. You know, you could have a a larger word response often, you know, 250 sort of is is generally the cap that I see, but but really useful and of course that’s a great, premise then for any marketing or any any media that you’re doing as well. So, you know, do do think about having a standard response for a brief overview of your organisation. Here we go. A lot of funders are asking for this, what your website and Facebook or Twitter information is.

This is so that they can tag you in, you know, for successful projects, but of course, and connect with you, but of course, you know, funders certainly do, broadly, funders do certainly do a little bit of research. So really useful if you’ve got anything on your Facebook page about or your website about the program, you know, really useful to, maybe you’ve got a Facebook post to pin that to the top so it’s the first thing that they see. Okay, so, Part B is only relevant in these guidelines if you’re actually partnering with somebody who’s going to hold and, receive and hold the grant funds. So some of you do work in partnership, some of you may not be the lead partner, you might be the secondary partner, so, if you are in this this, circumstance then you’ll need to deliver, you’ll need to complete Part B. It’s the same as Part A basically, it’s just for the different organisation, but if you’re not, yes you don’t have to worry about that. So, it’s exactly the same questions. Alright, let’s have a look at the actual kind of body of the application form. Project title, and project summary.

Now here’s a hot tip on project title and project summary. Let’s think about what the the foundation of the grant project is for. It’s about vibrant communities, it’s about sustainability and then there’s those key elements which is around economic benefits. So just think I’m not saying that you need to craft it, and say, you know, oh we’re delivering a vibrant project for a to, I’ll start again. We’re delivering a project that, you know, provides economic benefit to our vibrant community that’s going to be sustainable. I don’t know. I’m just coming up with words but you get my gist. We don’t use those words to create it but what you should get a sense of as a funder when you’re reading the project title and the project summary I should get a sense that, oh yeah, this actually does align.

And there, for me, there are those three key themes that keep coming through. Vibrant communities, sustainability, inclusiveness in that in that as well. And the third key theme is that economic. So, you know, really do think about that. The other key theme actually I’d have to say, would be that broad reach. So, you know, that’s where certainly that inclusiveness but that broad reach comes in. So there’s probably four for this. If your project fits all four, think about how you can actually give them a sense of that in the project summary.

And and I really wanna focus here on project summary to make sure that you you are looking at this the right way. Project summary isn’t about, oh, we’re doing this project and and we need funding for x y and z. So it’s not about the thing that you’re gonna get funding. If it was a financial literacy workshop, it’s not about the workshop. It is about the key aims of your project. So it’s about, you know, we’re we’re building financial the the thing that needs to happen but focus on the benefits, and that’s where, again, your economic, you know, premise will come through. When I’m reading the project summary I should know which of those three priorities it fits into which was, environment, finance or, housing. So I should know straight away when I’m reading that where it fits and of course what the projects will be used for.

Don’t go into detail here. You’ve got the budget to do that. Just broadly talk about that. And a and a tip for that, I would, certainly, again, have a look at those projects that that FRRR in their guidelines, gave as examples. If they’ve used those as examples, they obviously like those examples, so that’s a really great one to to go back and have a look at. And you’ll you’ll have your ANZ branch, etcetera, and volunteer opportunities. Let’s have a look at the activity tree. If you haven’t ever seen the activity tree before, you can follow that link.

That link will be in your application form. I’ve, downloaded that so we can view that. This is the activity tree. These basically, what this is is is the way that FRRR, strategically look at where they make a difference in community. And so what you’ll need to do, for example, this one, because it is very much about, an economic lens, probably a lot of projects will fit into this number six but for some of you, you know, it might be about, let’s just say, financial literacy. It could be about lifelong learning, education and training. So really do consider when we think about what our project delivers, where does it fit? And the great thing is you can just explore it, it’s seven pages, but it’s an interactive PDF. So I’m just going to click on ‘Education and Training’ and you’ll see a whole lot of other areas here, and for example this might be support, general I’m just going to scroll up if I can a bit there we go supporting sorry, it’s just popped up and, and covered up 5.4 which is supporting general or life skill development and you might see that that is then 5.4.2.

So you’ll actually have to follow the activity tree to determine where your project fits. So you’ll actually need to put that, into into this area here. So so just make sure that that, you know that you’re selecting the right one basically. If you’re not sure just click on them and read them and see which is the better one, out of all of them that you would align to. So the next question is what you will do?’. So this is about telling the assessors about your project, and look I would, you know, they’re wanting to know what the aim of your project is and what you’ll actually do. So think about this, you know, part of our job is to what I call layer the learning. They don’t know about your project.

You do. You’re all over it. You know all the detail. So start with, you know, headlines. So our project is x y and z. We’re going to in order to we’re going to achieve x y and z. In order to do that we will do the following and then you go into the detail, you know as much as as you can, obviously with the words that you have so, you know think about what those, you know, what your project is, what it’s delivering and then what you’re going to do to achieve those things. You know, they’ve certainly there are a couple of other questions that talk about project need, when it’s going to happen, etcetera, and the description of the main features and communities, but in terms of the aim of the project you can see, as I’m scrolling some of you can see this, others can’t, but I’ll just reinforce this, there is only one question that relates to giving more detail about what it’s achieving.

So this question here, because other questions go into more detail, you really do need to think about it as a sort of a broad question that gives the assessor the sense well, oh okay, I get what they’re doing, why they’re trying to do it and and what they’re going to do in order to achieve that.’ Does that make sense? It’s sort of like a think of it as a summary question. Sorry, Nat could you give an example of what you would write in that? Like, just say if you were, I don’t know if you’re doing it, I’ve seen a recycling project as one of the examples but if you could you yeah give us an example please. Yeah, so we could could do, the financial literacy one, for example, the workshop. Let’s just because that’s a one broadly that that, that everybody would understand, sort of training and workshops. So, when we’re talking about a project, our project is to build financial literacy in our community groups, across our region for example or across our our community. The aim of the project is to ensure that, financial informed financial decisions are being made by community groups, that community groups understand their financial statements. You know, that’s just a couple of examples. In order for us to achieve that, we will do the following. So we will consult with our community on those areas that they want further information on, that they feel that that they need, more support on. We have designed the project to deliver these foundational topics so, you know, it might be, budgeting 101, understanding your balance sheet for example And we will, bring on a trainer, we will have a venue, and we’ll provide catering for three workshops and online webinar support something like that.

Does that make sense? Yep. Beautiful. Great. And so that in essence is a real broad summary, isn’t it? Because the other questions go into further detail. So why is the project needed? This is really important, you know, if we’re saying that something’s needed we actually need to demonstrate that it is a need. For example we could have had, you know, these community members and volunteers saying well yes we need to know, we need to understand how to budget, you know we need to think about even what our organisation’s doing and how it’s more sustainable or how we’re we’re making sure that we’re managing our assets as well. So statistics, stories, you know, little testimonials from community groups, and from those those people in these community groups in financial literacy training example we’re using for example are really vital. It’s not all about stats.

People aren’t all driven by stats. You’ve got people that love stats, stats but all of us love stories so, so make sure that you’re including some of those in there. You can speak to sort of broader, financial literacy, statistics and data but it’s really important and FRRR in particular, you know, and I’m picking this up in their language, they care about local. So, you know, it’s really important that if you’re gonna use something else that’s showing an industry trend that you actually focus on what that means locally and how that’s represented locally. So then when will the project happen? That’s pretty kind of a straightforward question. Where will the project happen? And you can see here, and again this is an indication, as I’ve mentioned that you know they do like projects with sort of broader impacts across areas and so, you know if we were doing one for example in local government that had some villages, you know I’ve been, been in Tenterfield area recently and we’ve had five workshops across five different, or four different communities. So this is an example of one that, you know, we would certainly put down and it’s certainly demonstrating that that there is appetite for having a project that is broader than just one town, and you’re able to include the local government areas as well there, if that includes a couple of different local government areas. So the next question is about briefly describing the main features of the community or communities where your project will occur.

So if you are crossing a lot of different communities or even more than one, my suggestion is use a heading and differentiate those communities but really focus on describing this. We really need to get a sense for that community. Look, part of the reason some organisations ask these sorts of questions is that that they might have information that tells them this and they’re seeing if that’s correct but also they’re seeing how well you actually do know your community. If you do know this information, if we’re saying that there is a project that’s needed by the community, well do you know your community enough that you’re able to provide this information? Now, for, rural, regional, remote communities that are small, you know my strong suggestion here if you need help with answering this question is to go to your local government, a community plan and they will have some information there that describes the community. So it’s generally called a community strategic plan. If you also work in a specific area, let’s just say youth, then look at all council plans connected with youth and that’ll provide you some more information. It’s kind of what what we call R and D rip off and duplicate. If the information’s correct there’s not much point, spending a lot of time getting it.

For larger, organisations or, communities that are joining us, you may be able to access some of this information in a website which is called profile.id, so profile.id, but, you know, it needs to be sort of a larger community to be able to get quality data out of that system. Otherwise, for everyone else, go and have a look at your local government plans. I’ll just make a note we’re at, 01:31. I’ve just got a few more questions if you’d like to stick around, and then we’ll wrap. So who will benefit and be involved? Now one of the key things that can often trip people up here is, and I’m just going to bring up that other question, you’ve just described the main features of the community and the communities where your project’s going to occur. So when you think about, your project that that’s almost going to be a benchmark. You know, you’ve described this broad community, oh but you’re only supporting this amount but you’ve got, you know, this broader community. So, so that’s actually almost going to be a benchmark.

I’m not suggesting in any way because I’m not involved in this program but as an assessor, I know in other programs that I’ve been on where this has actually been considered particularly with something that a grant program like this that they’ve been really clear about a broader impact. So, you know, it is important to think about, to think about that and again when you’re thinking about your project if there’s opportunities to work with different organisations, to spread the impact, a lot broader. So who will benefit and be involved is really important. Paint a picture. Talk about your partners. Talk about if if we were talking about a a community group, for example, we wouldn’t just be mentioning the community group, we’d actually talk about the people that they help. So, you know, paint a picture and give them that that real understanding of that ripple effect that your project, project has and, of course, you know, again don’t forget those statistics, in, in all of your questions. Always think ‘Have I got a stat? Is there anything I should put a statistic in? Is there any opportunity to tell a story?’ So I always ask that, I’m quite stat driven so I always have to stop and go ‘where’s my story here?’ because you know I do the stats, I’m like ‘where’s my story Natalie?’ So always make sure you get that, that bit of a balance and again you’re asked to select the most appropriate target group options below.

One of the key things and if you haven’t already seen this in grant programs it’s certainly a theme, and, and probably not surprising anybody, around when projects are working with, with, young people with children that, that we as an organisation have established processes and policies to make sure that we’re appropriately dealing with, with the situations that occur in the environment surrounding the children that we’re working with. So probably no surprise, surprise, Office of Guardian in New South Wales, is a great resource and in other states and territories we have, similar organisations. So the other the other, elements are tick boxes, you know, the again ticking the box that most, applies to your project which is pretty straightforward. You should be able to, to do that, and the primary outcomes, you know, again you should be able to do that. One of the key things here in this question you can tick up to three. What I’d like you to do when you’re looking at this, go back up to that question ‘Where are we?’ what will you do and tell us about your project?’ If you’re going to tick the most the three most important areas, have you actually included that in this question? Because this question, remember, we said this is what the project is, this is what we aim to do and this is how we’re going to do it. You know, again it doesn’t have to be the word those words but as long as you can see that. The the key thing here is if you’re ticking something different that you haven’t already addressed as the aim of the project, it’s kind of like well why are you doing the project? You know there’s almost, you know, there’s enough of a difference for them to go oh okay that’s interesting’ so just make sure you’ve got alignment there.

And then what we should be seeing in this next question is that those, particularly those, three that you’ve just ticked as well as anything else that you’ve mentioned prior, particularly in that question where you’ve you’ve, you know, what is the project where you’ve talked about that aims, this is your opportunity to expand on those. Don’t introduce new information or new outcomes here, unless you know you’ve got the word count. If there’s something new I would actually leave it to the bottom of the question. Focus on those areas that the assessor can already understand because you’ve already talked about those previously. So focus on addressing those and then if you’ve got, some additional space, you know, certainly talk about those other outcomes. You know, goal here is to really, really make sure the funder knows you’re focused on those elements, so the deeper you can share information here, the stronger your project is likely to be. It’s not about trying to be everything to everybody, and you know again there are some great hints here that will help you with your response so consider those when you’re going through and answering that question. A couple of other questions related to, disaster and emergency response as well so, if that applies then tick that.

And we get to the budget, which, as mentioned earlier, I have a cheat sheet for you, and, you’re able to if you watch the recording, you’re able to download it below, and I will email that out to those that are attending today. So, the FRRR, every grant program has a different format for the budget but, but in essence you can see here when you’ve got the total project cost, the amount you’re wanting from FRRR, and, and what cash contribution your organisation is making. So, if you’ve got any donation or any amounts of money that you’re contributing, a hot tip here is to break that up. Let’s just say it’s a hundred dollars and you’ve got $50 of donations then put donations $50. If it’s how many donations? Let’s say it’s four. So you would put four donations $50. Let’s just say $25 of that has been, through volunteer fundraising efforts so you would put volunteer fundraising five hours twenty five dollars if that makes sense. So break it up.

Give them an indication of where that money has come from because that also helps them to understand actually, you know, there’s actually people that that support this project because they’ve actually given, cash and then you’ll be asked to put your expenditure amounts in, and then your in kind contributions. So in kind contributions are all those things that, that really, cost someone else, you know, it’s labour, it could be a discount, there’s a whole range of, of in kind amounts and you can see here that your volunteers, are able to be costed at $41 per hour, so you’ll be able to cost those services, as a as a volunteer. So the number of volunteers, the number of hours, the hourly rate, so make sure you pop that in as well and then what you will have, in the budget summary is you will actually have a zero amount. So your income and your expenditure which your, are total and you can see here that that, you know, they’ve said that includes in kind contribution, should be the total and and that’s, calculated. So you’ll just click the online form and it’ll calculate it for you. Basically the balance down here where it says balance total income less total expenditure should be zero. Now I’ve done a cheat sheet which is a little bit, hopefully helps, bring some clarity where I’ve actually said, you know, well the f triple r request is a’, so a plus x equals x and I and, and I’ll send that out so hopefully that makes it a little bit, bit clearer for you and then we we basically get to the end which is, you know, I said this earlier, if the fund has asked you for something you’ve got to provide it, otherwise you could be deemed ineligible. So, quotes, you know, make sure that you’re including them.

Look at what you’ve said you’re going to spend money on. Have you got a quote for that? So make sure that you include those documents and you can see that that they’ve given you, a lot of opportunity to provide those additional quotes there as well. So that’s the we’ve gone through the guidelines, we’ve gone through the application form, the following pages I’m showing you in the application form are more documents that that you will need to include, you know letters of support etc from partnering organisation and it’s just that that partnering organization leader of support that relates to, Part B that I mentioned earlier. If you’re partnering with someone that actually, is going to receive and distribute the grant funds and and, equip those grant funds and this is a letter of support for that, not not a normal sort of partner that you might have for your project, so just to be clear there, and also there’s financial attachments as well that that you definitely have to provide. The other one just on financial attachments, is just to take note of the requirements. So whether you’ve got audited financials or you don’t have audited financials and if you’re less than a year old, the types of supporting evidence you’ll need to provide. Again, if you don’t provide this information, you know, that may deem you ineligible. And the other one to think about is supporting information.

So supporting information, you know, it could be if you’ve got a one page project plan, the project planning canvas, that is available, if you’re watching the recorded session underneath to download and I’ll email that out to you, you can actually include that as a one pager. This is our community, our, our project plan. You could, if you’ve engaged the community in finding out what the project needs to be and let’s just say they’re all putting their ideas down, you could take a photo and include that. You could include a word cloud, of all of the words that are coming out via a community survey. There’s a lot of different different, things that you can provide, you know, letters of support etc. I will say, to make sure that if you’re providing supporting information, just think about your project and make sure that it directly supports what you’re saying to the funder. Don’t provide something that gets them confused and they think well why have they provided this one? They haven’t talked about it in the application form.’ So really focus on those elements. If you want to make sure you focus on, for example, the number of community members that are coming together to support it, then what you could do is you could in essence provide a list of all the different partnerships, you know, of all the different names of supporters for example.

You know, that’s a relevant, example. If you’re doing, a project that is more than your area let’s just say it’s across, the local government area then you could provide a map showing where the organisations are that are actually going to benefit from this. So that’s what I mean by relevant. It’s got to really support and strengthen what you’re saying, and you can see here that, that not only is it documents but also photos, etcetera and they’ve the last thing they’ve said, you know, if there’s any further information, if you provided something that that, you haven’t spoken about or you just want to make sure they understand context, you know, you’re certainly able to do that and then you basically confirm and, and away you go. You submit it before the the due date and, and your application is in. So I hope that has been really useful for you to, when you’re looking at the ANZ Seeds of Renewal grant program, and, you know, again have a look at the website, look at the guidelines, look at the application form but also look at that activity tree as well that I showed you earlier, and download those helpful documents, that will help you not just for this grant program but certainly, for other that, Project Planning Canvas will help you with all of your programs you’re wanting to seek funding for, be it grants or sponsorship and, if you’re applying for any future FRRR projects that budget cheat sheet will help you as well.