These grants support the research, testing and/or piloting of new ideas and creative solutions to current social and environmental issues. Seed Innovation Grants provide funding for grants up to $50,000 for one year.
The Foundation’s Chief Executive Officer Dr Catherine Brown OAM said, “The Seed Innovation Grants are critical to the Foundation’s model of philanthropy. They are the first step in the innovation process and can lead to further grants where solutions demonstrated at the seed stage can be scaled-up or replicated.
“A successful Seed Innovation Grant project might also generate enough evidence to attract government funding, impact investing or to establish a viable social enterprise.”
Education & Employment
Organisation: SYN Media
Project Title:
Seed Grant: $48,478
The Seed grant will enable SYN to expand its social enterprise activities through training and employment of young people as producers, editors and hosts in audio production.
Organisation: Swinburne University
Project Title:
Seed Grant: $48,052
Swinburne University will develop and test a new workplace inclusion model to support disadvantaged and marginalised groups in the workplace, including young people and people with disability.
Organisation: JobWatch
Project Title:
Seed grant: $50,000
JobWatch will develop a new online Multilingual Hub to provide key employment law information in the top 10 languages other than English spoken in Victoria being Mandarin, Italian, Greek, Vietnamese, Arabic, Cantonese, Punjabi, Hindi, Sinhalese and Spanish.
Environment & Sustainability
Organisation: Trust for Nature
Project Title: Securing our sustainably-managed farmland
Seed Grant: $40,000
Trust for Nature’s project is an action research analysis to define a permanent protection and collective ownership model, supporting sustainably managed farmland; notably important peri-urban farmlands threatened by encroaching development.
Organisation: Better Renting Limited
Project Title: Healthy Homes for Renters
Seed Grant: $45,000
Better Renting is coordinating a National Collaboration to secure a commitment for every Australian jurisdiction to implement minimum energy efficiency standards for rentals and provide ongoing advocacy for energy efficient homes for vulnerable households.
Organisation: Mount Alexander Sustainability Group
Project Title: Zero Net Retrofit for Vulnerable Communities Pilot
Seed grant: $50,000
Mount Alexander Sustainability Group will show how low-income owner-occupiers and renters can have their homes retrofitted to a Zero Net standard using Environmental Upgrade Agreements (EUA).
Healthy & Resilient Communities
Organisation: The Australian Centre for Social Innovation
Project Title: Foregrounding Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Wisdom
Seed Grant: $50,000
The Australian Centre for Social Innovation will plan and create an Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander led systems change network whose purpose is to reimagine and strengthen existing community resilience systems.
Organisation: Australian Youth Climate Coalition
Project Title: Seed Mob
Seed Grant: $50,000
The vision is for Seed Mob to become an independent not-for-profit and to build and mobilise Indigenous communities for action on climate justice, while increasing the resilience of First Nations peoples to lead solutions to the climate crisis.
Organisation: Not Yet It’s Difficult
Project Title: Assembly for the Future
Grant $49,750
Assembly for the Future will create a series of participatory, digital gatherings in which the public co-create new visions for the future, building connections, hope and opportunities in response to social, climatic and health challenges.
Homelessness & Affordable Housing
Organisation: Federation University
Project: Shared Equity Homeownership Scheme for the Younger Segment of the Population in Melbourne
Grant: $50,000
Surveys of Victorian NRAS dwellings indicate a high rate of young tenants (18-44 age group) with home ownership aspirations. This project will establish the number of young NRAS tenants in Victoria and what the level of home ownership aspiration is among this group.
Organisation: RMIT University
Project Title: Homelessness to a Home (H2H) Evaluation
Grant: $43,118
This project will evaluate the outcomes of the From Homelessness to a Home (H2H) program. H2H is a Victorian State government initiative to provide access to long-term housing and support for 1,845 households who are residing in emergency accommodation due to Covid-19. It is important for the sector to share learnings from this program.
Organisation: St Kilda Legal Service
Project Title: Fair income for housing Early intervention to secure the correct income support for people experiencing homelessness
Grant: $50,000
The project will scale up SKLS support to Launch Housing residents with a project lawyer who will intervene early to support residents making Centrelink applications and seeking internal review of initial adverse decisions.