Call for Applications for Small Grants for Civil Society Organizations (CSO) under the Inform Women, Transform Lives Campaign

Access to information (ATI) is a fundamental right enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and critical for the exercise of basic socio-economic and political rights. Access to information can ensure that social services reach the most vulnerable and disadvantaged populations, support true accountability, allow for more meaningful participation and voice, serve as a link to other human rights, and encourage greater government responsiveness. Yet in many countries, one-half of the population–women–are limited in their full enjoyment of the right of access to information and the myriad benefits that it may provide.

The Carter Center’s Inform Women, Transform Lives campaign seeks to enhance awareness of women’s right to information, to increase the number of women accessing information about municipal and social services in participating cities, and to support these local governments in reaching women with meaningful information. The campaign includes integrated media campaigns, civil society participation, and collaboration and exchange of ideas between The Carter Center and the municipalities selected to participate in this transformative global initiative.

A group of cities with demonstrated commitment to transparency and gender equality were invited to submit an application to implement the campaign, and a panel of judges selected the 13 final participating cities: Atlanta, USA; Amman, Jordan; Buenos Aires, Argentina; Cape Town, South Africa; Chicago, USA; Colombo, Sri Lanka; Dhaka North, Bangladesh; Dublin, Ireland; Guatemala City, Guatemala; Kampala, Uganda; Lima, Peru; Monrovia, Liberia; and São Paulo, Brazil.

The Carter Center supports these local governments to implement an integrated media campaign in their cities to raise awareness of women’s right to information and related to their selected municipal service(s). The specific city campaign themes/areas of focus have been determined by each municipality and focus on services/programs which are available for women but are not being accessed because of a lack of information and awareness.

Through small grants, The Carter Center seeks to support local civil society organizations in each city to conduct complementary programming in alignment with the city’s identified campaign goal. The Center will manage/provide oversight for all subgrants.

Application Overview

Issue date:

November 5, 2021

Application deadline:

17:00 GMT November 25, 2021

Maximum total amount awarded:

$10,000 USD. The amount of the award per organization depends on the number of awards provided, with a maximum of 2 awards.

Duration:

Maximum of 4 months (December 1, 2021 – March 31, 2022)

Thematic Areas:

• Raising awareness and usage of the Dublin City Council and the North East Inner City’s webpage and hotline to ensure women in the NEIC have access to required information about municipal and social services in their area.
• Promoting the Local Enterprise Office (LEO) Dublin City services for women, including providing new and existing women-owned small businesses with the expert advice, tailored training and financial supports they need to help them thrive.

The Carter Center plans to award a small grant(s) to eligible civil society organizations (CSO) of up to a total of USD 10,000, with at most 2 grants awarded. The grants are intended exclusively to finance a limited range of activities to support the Inform Women, Transform Lives activities in Dubiln. The Carter Center invites civil society organizations legally established and operating in Dublin to submit applications, as elaborated in this notice[1]. Each organization may submit only one application.

Women-led organizations are encouraged to apply.

Illustrative Activities:

• Community-based activities to demonstrate the value of access to information for women,
• Short-term projects that creatively raise awareness of access to information,
• Engage and/or assist women to seek and use public information, with a focus on the information/services being promoted and disseminated as part of the city’s Inform Women, Transform Lives campaign,
• Case studies of increasing awareness and/or women successfully accessing and using information to their benefit.

Applicants are encouraged to be creative and cost-effective in their ideas of how to effectively raise awareness, engage, and/or support women to access information and encourage increased use of the city services. Applicants must align their proposals with one or more of the thematic areas as designed by the city.

Submission:

Applicants should submit their documents to Informwomen[email protected] no later than 17:00 GMT on November 25, 2021 with the following subject line: “[APPLICANT ORGANIZATION NAME] Inform Women, Transform Lives DUBLIN CSO Proposal”.

Applications should include:

• A narrative proposal, including but not limited to:
  • Background understanding of the issue of women’s right of access to information;
  • A program design overview and details of potential activity(ies) and their impacts, including identified beneficiary groups and an implementation timeline;
  • Identified working areas for the programming; and
  • Organizational qualifications to lead this work
• A budget, detailing line item and activity costs, including staff allocation, for the suggested time-period.

The proposal should not exceed 5 pages. The Carter Center will not consider applications sent by any other means than email or to different addresses.

Requirements:

The successful local civil society organization will be required to complete a pre-award survey from The Carter Center.

Instructions To Applicants:

Basic Parameters

The Carter Center invites qualified parties to submit technical and financial proposals to provide services associated with the project background, based on the following:

1. 1. 1. Applications must align with the services required, as described in the Terms of Reference.
      2. The Carter Center may, at its discretion, cancel the services in part or in whole.

Cost of proposal

Costs of preparing a proposal are the applicants’ responsibility, regardless of the outcome.

Eligibility

The Carter Center reserves the right to verify any information contained in the applicant’s proposal or to request additional information after the proposal is received.

Questions related to RFP documents

A prospective applicant requiring clarification of the required RFP documents may contact The Carter Center in writing at [email protected]. The Carter Center will respond in writing to any request for clarification of the RFP documents that it receives by November 19, 2021. All questions and clarifications will be shared with all applicants.

Language of proposal

The proposal and all related correspondence and documents must be written in English.

Submission of proposal

1. Technical and financial proposals must be submitted using the template provided in this RFP under Annex 1. Proposals submitted in another format will not be accepted. The proposal, including all supporting documents, must be submitted in its entirety in one (1) email, with the following subject line: [APPLICANT ORGANIZATION NAME] Inform Women, Transform Lives DUBLIN CSO Proposal. The email text body should indicate the name and address of the applicant. Each document attached to the submission email must also include the applicant’s organization name and document title. If the emails and email attachments are not marked as instructed, The Carter Center will not assume responsibility for the misplacement of any applicant documents.

b. All proposals should be sent by email to the following email address: [email protected] and must be received by November 25, 2021, 17:00 GMT. Proposals received after the due date and time will not be accepted.

Clarification of proposals

To assist in the examination, evaluation, and comparison of proposals, The Carter Center may request further clarification in writing from an applicant after the proposal submission deadline. To ensure timely review, any requests for further clarification or information must be answered by the applicant within 3 business days.

Proposal currencies

All prices quoted in the financial proposal must be in United States Dollars only. The contract will be issued in United States Dollars.

Evaluation of technical and financial proposal

Technical Proposal

Proposals must include the following sections (see Annex 1 for the proposal template and detailed section descriptions):

1. Organizational background and capacity to implement activities to achieve planned results
2. Expected results, indicator(s), and monitoring plan (see Annex 2)
3. Description of activities
4. Implementation plan
5. Supporting Materials

- CVs for key project team members

- Summary of previous awards and list of references

Applicants must be able to demonstrate organizational experience and ability to plan and manage programming, monitor and report on progress, and maintain financial compliance.

Financial Proposal

Financial proposals will be evaluated following completion of the technical proposal evaluation and should utilize the budget template which will provided. Applicants are encouraged to develop a clear budget, with budget narrative/notes, that is realistic and includes only a small portion of costs for overhead expenses. Budgets must be consistent with proposed activities. The applicant must have the ability to account for all costs and be able to demonstrate an ability to properly reconcile expenses and maintain acceptable standards of compliance. There will be an allocation of up to $10,000 per city. The amount of funding per organization depends on the number of awards issued per city but will not exceed two awards per city.

Award

The award will be made to the most qualified applicant(s) who are able to successfully demonstrate their capacity to implement the activities outlined in their proposal with the greatest efficiency and best costing. The Carter Center reserves the right to negotiate with the selected applicant(s) to adjust their proposal to meet The Carter Center’s program objectives. The award will only go into effect once all components of an applicant(s)’ proposal are agreed upon and an agreement between the applicant(s) and The Carter Center is signed.

The selected applicants are expected to commence providing services as of the date and time stipulated in this RFP. The award will be for an agreement for up to four months, with the firm end date of March 31, 2022.

The Carter Center has the authority to cancel this RFP based on funding or poor performance.

[1] This notice forms the basis for applying for a small grant under the Inform Women, Transform Lives campaign. It must neither be construed as an agreement nor as a confirmation of an award by The Carter Center to any entity. Consequently, The Carter Center is not liable for any financial obligations, or otherwise, incurred by any entity in responding to this advertisement. The Carter Center will not approve such costs as part of any grant budget, and an awardee must not use the grant funds to cover such costs.