Rising Voices supports people in sharing knowledge and skills about
citizen media for digital storytelling and citizen participation. Since
2007, we have supported 40 small-scale citizen media projects with
funding and mentoring and welcomed them to the Global Voices community.
These projects have helped local leaders introduce new and
underrepresented voices to the global digital conversation, shining a
light on issues that are important to their own communities.
Over the past three years of holding microgrant competitions, we have
seen how awareness of digital tools and communication has spread
exponentially. We have received thousands of applications from more than
100 countries. With this in mind, we are increasing the number of
grants we will award this year, even though they will be slightly
smaller than in the past.
In 2014, we will be awarding up to 10 micro-grants of between USD $2,000-2,500
to projects with a strong and clear idea for how to provide training
and ongoing support to a local community. New grantees will join the
Rising Voices network and will be featured on Global Voices.
GUIDELINES
Rising Voices seeks proposals that share our mission of using online
citizen media as a tool for self-empowerment, understanding between
people, and social change.
We are looking for projects that:
1. Actively engage members of a local community that is “underrepresented” online, either demographically, linguistically, or geographically. We are especially looking to support leaders who themselves belong to these communities and know how and why citizen media could benefit community members. If the applicant is not a member of the community, local residents or community members must be a part of developing and implementing the project.
2. Provide training, mentoring and leadership. We want project leaders who are eager to share their knowledge and skills with others. Through hands-on training in citizen media production and storytelling techniques, participants will feel equipped and confident to take full advantage of the tools. Ongoing support is essential in the formation of a productive digital storytelling community.
3. Tell digital stories about issues important to the community. After participants take part in training workshops they are ready to share their voices with the world. We are looking for stories that give insight to the community, their challenges or successes, told from a uniquely personal perspective.
4. Use free and widely available citizen media tools and social media platforms. This may include blogs, microblogs like Twitter, free software like Audacity for editing audio, SoundCloud, Audioboo, or Radioteca. Video sites like YouTube and Vimeo, or mapping with OpenStreetMaps. You might also consider using social networking sites like Facebook to distribute your content.
We encourage you to be creative and ambitious, yet realistic in your proposals. See the Frequently Asked Questions for additional information.
To apply, please visit the “Submit a Proposal”
page, where you will find short questions that will help you outline
your project plan. We encourage concise answers (with specific character
limits) to help you organize your thoughts into what matters most.
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