We are always looking for sources of funding, so if you know of any, please let us know! So far we've received grants from the Cooperative Bank, Cambridge Sustainable City, Education Services, Lush, and several individual donations. If you'd like to make us a donation, please e-mail Martin (our treasurer) for more information.
Lush have kindly funded us to organise 10 high profile events around Cambridge on different Transition related themes, with the aim that these events will lead to groups working on the different topics. Possible topics include housing, economics, business, healthcare, education etc (and lots more!).
If you would like to take a lead in organising one of these events and helping a group to get started looking at a particular topic, we'd love to hear from you. Possible ideas include organizing a film showing on the topic, inviting a speaker to talk about it, and organising a discussion, open space style event or workshop looking at the issues... You'll need to find a venue, and invite enough people to come to make it a worthwhile event, possibly advertising through local media etc. Ideally we'd like these events to run as a series, and to be held in the different parts of Cambridge.
Here is what we said in our grant application, to give you some idea of what the events need to do. If you would like to organize one of these events, please get in touch with your ideas! (The committee will need to agree, and we'll need a short report on the event so that we can let Lush know what we used the money for.)
Here is the wording that we used in the grant application:
"This Project aims to engage with a much larger part of the community, enabling a larger-scale response to peak oil and climate change. To reach the larger community, we need to organise bigger awareness-raising events engaging different groups within the community and different areas of the city, using high-profile speakers and popular activities to draw people in. While most people are concerned about climate change, many know little about the challenge of peak oil, and few understand the urgency of the situation. Through these events, Transition Cambridge will both raise awareness of the issues, and inspire people to take action, focusing on how we can create a positive sustainable future.
The project will organise a series of 10 high profile events throughout the city. These events will raise awareness about peak oil and climate change, and will focus on creating practical positive responses to increase resilience and sustainability.
The target group for this project are the residents of Cambridge, in particular those not yet engaged with the issues of peak oil and climate change. We aim to target diverse groups within the community (including lower income groups, different ethnic and faith groups, and a variety of age groups). The project will take place in Cambridge, with events organised in the different neighbourhoods around Cambridge.
Organising high profile awareness-raising events around Cambridge:
1. Planning a succession of 10 themed events that lead on from one another and lead up to a Great Unleashing event. Themes are likely to include the future of food, housing, healthcare, education, economics, business and the need for skills-sharing in a low carbon post-oil world.
2. Inviting well-known popular speakers to talk about different aspects of transition, such as renewable energy, local food production, local currencies, co-housing to address these themes.
3. Booking venues and publicising events e.g. by putting up posters, appearing on local radio, having articles in local newspapers and magazines.
4. Running events, ensuring that participants have the opportunity to meet others involved with transition and to become more involved.
5. Organising follow-up events where new topic groups can form to take on new practical projects.
We anticipate that several thousand people will become aware of the challenges and opportunities of peak oil and climate change. Some of these will form action groups working on areas such as housing, a local currency, low-carbon businesses, healthcare, education, and skills-sharing (amongst others), and will plan and carry out projects that contribute to a reduction in energy use by these sectors and increase resilience to fluctuations in oil prices. These groups will contribute to the creation and implementation of an energy descent action plan for Cambridge (working alongside the City Council), which will map how Cambridge can reduce its energy use and dependency on oil while building a positive and sustainable future for the city.
Cost of venue: £30-£50
Inviting speakers and covering their travel costs: £30-100
Publicity (posters, fliers, placing ads): £30-80
Flip-charts/pens/paper/other materials: £10
Refreshments: £20
Maximum budget available for each event: £190\\"
(Ideally the event budget will be a bit less than this, so that there is some spare to organise a follow-up event to get a group started working on the topic.)
We can lend you a digital projector if you want to show a film or give a presentation.
We'd like to say a huge thank you to Lush for offering us this grant through their Charity Pot Fund!
Transition Cambridge aims to help Cambridge make the transition to ways of life that are more resilient in the face of rising energy prices and a changing climate.