Civic Futures 3 Prospectus

Civic Futures is a 15-month programme which requires participants to commit 1.5 days a month spread between a mixture of individual and group work with other civic leaders, public servants and activists. The programme begins in September 2022, with scheduled learning sessions running until May 2023, after which participants will have until December 2023 to design and carry out community-based experiments.

As a Civic Futures Fellow, you will be offered a series of individual coaching sessions, be invited to take part in a self and peer review, and join a range of collaborative workshop and learning spaces with other Fellows from across civil society, community activist spaces, and local government; all dedicated to exploring strategies for the city’s recovery and renewal.

The September-May programme will follow a mixed model of in person and online sessions, to ensure a balance of accessibility and relationship building between the group. The dates are all set in advance and are available here:

• Thursday 8th September 2022, 10am-1pm - in person
• Thursday 6th October 2022, 10am-1pm - virtual
• Thursday 3rd November 2022, 10am-1pm - in person
• Thursday 1st December 2022, 10am-1pm - virtual
• Thursday 5th January 2023, 10am-1pm - in person
• Thursday 2nd February 2023, 10am-1pm - virtual
• Thursday 2nd March 2023, 10am-1pm - in person
• Thursday 6th April 2023, 10am-1pm - virtual
• Thursday 4th May 2023, 10am-1pm - in person

Civic Futures is built each year in collaboration with Fellows, and as such the below is suggested as a possible journey through the year.

• Inquiry & Connection: A period in which Fellows work with each other and the programme partnership to explore personal and learning inquiries, with the aim of surfacing common themes, issues and opportunities.
• Provocation: A series of thought-provoking presentations and discussions convened by the programme partnership and Fellows which bring together perspectives on London’s civic future.
• Exploration: A period in which those common themes are deeply explored in the interests of surfacing equitable, collaborative experiments between civic leaders, community activists, and public servants.
• Retrospective: An opportunity to come together to look back retrospectively and review the Fellowship experience as a whole. It is a chance for Fellows to celebrate the work that has happened and plan for next steps in collaborative working groups, partnerships and as individuals. The shared learning which emerges through this session will inform future iterations of the Fellowship.

In order to support people who are volunteers, freelance, not in employment, or working in small organisations to take part in this programme, we are offering a small number of bursaries to pay for people’s time taking part in the programme. We will also pay expenses for those people to attend sessions for people travelling to different parts of London.

Civic Futures is open from now until 20th June for expressions of interest to join the programme in September 2022. There are two routes for people to join the programme; firstly you can express interest and apply yourself, or alternatively you can nominate someone else.

Applying

If you want to take part in Civic Futures then you can express your interest straight away by filling in your details and answering some short questions in an online form which can be accessed here.

Nomination

If you want to nominate someone to the Fellowship you’ll need to complete an online form sharing your details, and the details of the person you’d like to nominate. We’ll then be in touch with the person you nominated to see whether they’d like to take an application forward. They will then be made aware of the nomination and asked to complete an application form.

The timeline for applications and nominations is as follows:

• Applications and Nominations open: Tuesday 17th May
• Deadline for nominating someone: Monday 20th June
• Deadline for applying: Monday 4th July

The aim of Civic Futures is to convene a cohort of committed civic leaders and public servants who represent the diversity of the city’s civic system, whether in terms of their work, mission, identity, or location. As a result all applications will be assessed against the same agreed criteria, before convening a selection panel, which will result in Fellowship offers in the last week of July 2022.

We are looking for people whose work is rooted in community, with a proven track record of working in and with that community to serve their interests and experiences. It is essential that you will come into this space with a spirit of collaboration and learning, and are ready to engage with the big questions of London’s future in an open and equitable way. Finally, we are looking for people who are excited to commit to a journey of collaboration and learning with peers from across civil society and government.

If you have any questions please email the team at [email protected].