We are delighted to launch Culture Champions GM. Ambition for Ageing has developed this work in partnership with the Great Place GM project. Both partnerships are collaborating on a joint piece of work to ensure Greater Manchester is a great place to grow older.

This work seeks to develop an innovative, age friendly cultural offer across Greater Manchester, to be driven by volunteers known as Culture Champions. Culture Champions GM is based on the sucesssful Manchester Age-Friendly Culture Champions project; a large-scale volunteer ambassador project which has sucessfully engaged a wide range of people over 50 with cultural venues and activity in the city, from museums and theatres to galleries and concert halls.

We are now looking for partner organistions to develop the programme in other areas of Greater Manchester to ensure that a broad range of older people, representative of the local communities in Greater Manchester have the same opportunities to design and engage in cultural activity in their local areas in ways that meet local needs.

The Great Place scheme is funded by Arts Council England and Heritage Lottery Fund and designed to put arts, culture and heritage at the heart of communities across England. Great Place: Greater Manchester is working together with all ten GM boroughs to improve access to culture for residents, to develop and diversify the cultural workforce and to demonstrate, through intelligent and collaborative working, that culture can create real economic, health and social benefits for our residents and the city-region.

As part of this work, Manchester Museum will support successful bids to develop their own, bespoke projects, to build on the Manchester experience, share knowledge between providers and disseminate learning from this groundbreaking scheme nationally and internationally.

Culture Champions aims to include a wide range of older people in cultural activity and volunteering and to broaden the cultural offer taking place in communities. We are particularly interested in proposals which focus on reaching older people at risk of social isolation and those older people who do not currently access cultural activity in their local areas.

We are looking for bespoke approaches to developing a cultural offer which matches the diverse interests of older people in specific Greater Manchester districts. Proposals should build on exisiting cultural provision and where little or no appropriate provision exists, consider how need can be met with new activity.

One project will focus on Manchester and there will be projects in three of the seven other districts that Ambition for Ageing work in: Bolton, Bury, Oldham, Rochdale, Wigan, Salford and Wigan. 
Providers will manage a small payments scheme to support the development of new activities which reflects the communities’ cultural interests and need.

Project requirements

Your bid should show the asset-based approach that your organisation will take to delivering this programme. This should include how you will recruit Culture Champions volunteers in your area, how you will develop a cultural offer through co-production. You should show an awareness of the current cultural landscape in your area and have good networks of relevant partners from other sectors. 

One project will focus on Manchester and there will be projects in three of the seven other districts that Ambition for Ageing work in: Bolton, Bury, Oldham, Rochdale, Salford, Tameside and Wigan. (Not Trafford or Stockport).

Contract length and value

The contract period will run from April 2019 until March 2020. Each successful provider will receive £40,000 over the period of the contract.

Bidders should allocate a budget for small payments to support activities and we expect this to be within the range of £10,000 - £20,000.

To find out more

If you are interested in being part of this innovative cultural programme and want to find out more about bidding for this work, please visit the GMCVO website and register on the bidding portal where you can download the bidding documents.

Upcoming bidder event

GMCVO recommends that organisations interested in applying for this work attend the Bidder Engagement Event. This will give prospective applicants the opportunity to learn more about the project principles, the delivery model and the approach GMCVO is looking for.

The event will take place at GMCVO St Thomas Centre, Ardwick Green North, Manchester, M12 6FZ – Tuesday 29th January 1pm to 3.30pm.

• To book your place please click here.

Full details of the guidance event for potential bidders can also be found on the Events section of the GMCVO website.

Final deadline for submissions

12 noon, Wednesday 13th February