Social Impact Grants FAQs

12 grants of $5000 are available.  

There are no restrictions or requirements on how the grant funding should be used. However, we ask that you provide a clear and detailed budget in your application.  

Yes, if you are applying as part of the ‘Thriving communities’ theme.  

We would like to see evidence that the community partner has a significant level of interest and involvement. It’s important for them to be engaged in the design and implementation of the project.  

If you are applying to the ‘Safe and inclusive UTS’ category, you do not need to have an external community partner, but you must have an internal partner from a different faculty, unit or area across the university.   

Examples of community partners may include:  

• An NGO or charity  
• A peak body organisation  
• A local health district or school  
• An individual community member  
• A grassroots community organisation  
• Traditional Owners or Elders  
• An activist/advocacy group.  

Industry partners, commercial entities, or other university staff members do not count as community partners under the Thriving Communities theme.  

You need to provide a short letter of support from your community partners to demonstrate their support and engagement in the project.  

In your application, you will also need to clearly explain how you and your partner are collaborating. We want to know how your partner is involved in the project, how you are working together and how you are ensuring the project is co-led.   

Yes. All applications under the Safe and inclusive theme must be an internal UTS cross-faculty/unit/area collaboration. This means it must be a joint project between 2 different areas of the university. Some examples of what this could look like include:

• Faculty of Health and the Faculty of Science (cross-faculty collaboration)  
• Faculty Engineering and IT and UTS Library (cross-faculty/unit collaboration)
• Jumbunna & Institute of Sustainable Futures (cross-unit/area collaboration)  

Applications under this theme with no collaboration (e.g. an application solely from one faculty, area or unit) will not be considered eligible for a grant.  

• Faculties
• Units/Divisions
• Other UTS areas (such as UTS Activate, UTS Housing)
• Student groups
• Staff groups  

For the Safe and Inclusive UTS theme, you must get endorsement from both:

• The relevant Equity, Diversity and Inclusion committee
• The Dean (faculties) or relevant Pro-Vice Chancellor/Deputy Vice Chancellor (Units, Centres, Division etc).

For the Thriving Communities theme, you must get endorsement from both:

• Your external community partner  
• The Dean (faculties) or relevant Pro-Vice Chancellor/Deputy Vice Chancellor (Units, Centres, Division etc).

Applications from the Business Faculty must also get endorsement from the Associate Dean (Research), Kathy Walsh, and the Associate Dean (Education), Katie Schlenker, for teaching-related research. 

For external community partners, we require a letter of endorsement from your community partner to be uploaded alongside your application.

For Dean or PVC/DVC approval and endorsement from the EDI Committees, we operate on trust-based system. You do not need to attach proof of approval with your application, but we expect that you will have sought and received it (via email or verbal confirmation) before submitting.  

Please see the table below for details on how to obtain approval and the relevant contact person for each EDI Committees. 

As noted in the table above, applications from the Faculty of Design and Society, and the Faculty of Law will need to use their internal partners committee for endorsement, as these two areas are not able to review applications. If this is not an option for your application, please email socialimpactgrants@uts.edu.au so we can help you. 

All UTS staff members, including professional, academic, casual, continuing, and sessional can apply.  

Projects and staff from the Centre for Social Justice and Inclusion will not be considered for funding.  

Yes! Both undergraduate and postgraduate students can apply for the grants. They will need to have a nominated staff supervisor for their project, who will receive the funds and act as a supervisor throughout the process.  

We encourage students to work with their staff supervisor to develop their application.  

The application does ask for evidence of experience and understanding in the area you will be working on, so you’re encouraged to outline your experience, as well as the experience of your supervisor.  

As a student applicant, you need to understand your responsibilities if you are successful in gaining a grant, such as:

• Time commitment: You should ensure you have the capacity to deliver the project within the grant timeline, balancing your study and other responsibilities.
• Financial accountability: the staff supervisor is formally responsible for the grant funds, but you should understand and be involved in the basic budgeting and acquittal process.  
• Partnership expectations: when working with community/external partners or internal UTS partners, you must be mindful of the importance of respectful, timely communication and shared decision-making.  
• Communication with your staff supervisor: You must communicate with your supervisor if you achieve different milestones in your projects, are having challenges, acquire new funding or stakeholders, or want to deviate from the activities or outcomes in your approved project  
• Following proper research ethics: You must understand the importance of following proper ethics processes for projects and be aware of how to seek support or expertise you may not have.  
• Project outcomes: You must understand the importance of adhering to the activities, plans and outcomes in your application.  

As a staff supervisor for a student, you act as a co-lead for the project and have joint responsibility for its delivery. This means we expect you to:

• have regular communication and check-ins with your student
• be aware of and across project updates and milestones, including challenges or changes to the project
• If necessary, escalate project risks or concerns or take action

This is also inclusive of helping students with the financial, academic, and administrative aspects of the project, such as supporting them through the ethics process, grant acquittals, required documentation, appropriate engagement with internal and/or external stakeholders and research participants, and risk mitigation.  

You need to set out a collaborative way of working with your student that will work for both of you at the outset of your project, so you both feel comfortable raising issues or addressing any challenges that may arise.  

Yes! Please email socialimpactgrants@uts.edu.au with your inquiry and we will find a time to talk to you about your application.  

Yes, you can. Please ensure you lodge a separate application for each individual project.  

Previous Social Impact Grant recipients may apply but will not be considered for a similar or related project in the 2026 round.   

The information session will be recorded and made available on the Social Impact Grants website roughly one week after the session.  

The evaluation workshops are mandatory for successful applicants. If you are unable to attend for a reasonable reason (e.g. you’re teaching), please don’t let this stop you from applying. We will negotiate with successful applicants on dates to ensure everyone can attend.    

There are no ethics requirements for the grant application process; however, your project will need to adhere to UTS Ethics and Integrity guidelines. You can read about these here.

Yes, we encourage project teams to apply, noting the lead of the project must be a UTS staff member.  

Please note, fellow academics and practitioners from other universities are not counted as community partners in the ‘Thriving Communities’ theme.