Funding Details

Funding available

• 4 x funding grants of £3,000
• Our exciting new match funding details will be revealed soon!

Funding covers

Any UK-based digitisation project, provided in the form of TownsWeb Archiving’s digitisation and software services of equivalent value.

Funding covers the digitisation of:

Bound Volume Collections

• Diaries & Minute Books
• Journals & Magazine
• Manuscripts
• Newspapers
• Photograph Albums & Scrapbooks
• Published Books & Thesis
• Registers & Personal Records

Archive Collections

• Index Cards
• Report & Letters (Loose Items)
• Rolls & Parchment

Photograph Collections

• 35mm Slides & Film Strips
• Glass Plates & Lantern Slides
• Negatives & Transparencies
• Photographs

Part of the grant may be used to fund:

• Transcription of metadata
• OCR (optical character recognition) data capture

Funding does not cover

• Projects that do not involve at least some element of image capture
• On-location digitisation at client’s premises
• Audio-visual digitisation projects
• 3D digitisation projects
• Cataloguing of entire collections
• Pure digitisation training
• Purchase of digitisation equipment
• Salaries for project staff
• Archive website design/build
• Setup of Digital Collections Management System

Judging criteria

Our judging panel includes John Chambers (ARA), Claire Adler (heritage fund appointed mentor & independent heritage consultant), and Paul Sugden (TWA), who will assess each application across four primary areas:

• Heritage need: Heritage value, uniqueness and importance of the collection.
• Social/community impact: How local people and communities will benefit from the collection.
• Research value: Whether academic, social historians, genealogists, or other researchers.
• Improved accessibility: Such as platforms, preservation and website access.

Further guidance can be found within the Grant Application Form.

Judging panel

Applications for the TWA Digitisation Grant will be assessed and the winning applicants chosen by our panel of three judges.

John Chambers
Chief Executive of the Archives & Records Association
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Claire Adler
Heritage Fund Appointed Mentor & Independent Heritage Consultant
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Paul Sugden
MD & Senior Digitisation Consultant at TownsWeb Archiving
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Who can apply?

Any UK based:

• Public, private & charity archives
• Business/corporate archives
• Public & private libraries
• Museums
• Galleries
• Institutions and organisations that have applied in previous years (even if the application is for the same collection/ project).

Note: We currently do not accept applications from:

• Private individuals with personal collections
• Digitisation/scanning bureaus

Closing date and how to apply

All applications must be submitted by 11:59pm on 29th July 2022. Winners will be announced live at the ARA Annual Conference and via live stream on 1st September 2022.

To receive access to the grant application form, click here and complete the short form. The grant application form will then be sent to you via the email address provided.

Details of the closing date and how to apply are yet to be confirmed.

Contact

Please email any TWA Digitisation Grant queries to [email protected]

Terms & Conditions

A full list of Terms & Conditions for the TWA Digitisation Grant can be viewed here.