Application guideline
Guideline for online application
to the USable Transatlantic Idea Competition
The following guideline will assist you in filling out our online application form. The questions within can serve as a reference, but it is not required to answer all of the individual questions.
Step 1: Personal details
Main contact
Please specify a main contact with whom we can correspond during the competition. Be sure that all required information is entered. We insist upon this so that we can communicate with you during the entirety of the competition and beyond.
In the first round of the selection process, the jury nominates 20 initiatives that then receive support in the form of workshops on, for example, fundraising, communications and management for nonprofit projects. With these workshops, the Körber Foundation would like to assist in the practical application of innovative projects. Should your initiative become one of the 20 nominated projects, the main contact will be invited to these workshops.
Step 2: Description of the initiative
The name of your initiative
If your project/plan has no title, a very short descriptive phrase will suffice.
Short description of the initiative
Please provide an initial short summary of your project
- What are the goals of the initiative?
- How does the initiative relate to the competition's theme?
- Whom does it benefit and who will take an active part in its implementation?
The short description will afford the jury a quick overview in order to classify the project. Very soon you will have the opportunity for a more extensive portrayal of your initiative.
Be sure that your text is short enough to be automatically entered into the database. The limit is 500 characters including spaces.
Detailed description of the initiative
Please describe the concept of your project in detail. The following list of questions may serve as a guideline for your description. In all cases, you should make clear your project's relationship to North America and how it derives its inspiration from the American sense of public spirit.
Be sure that your text is short enough to be automatically entered into the database. The limit is 7000 characters including spaces, which corresponds roughly to two pages of A4 paper (8½" x 11"). It is recommended to create the text in Microsoft Word and then copy-and-paste it into the online application.
- Which issues does your plan address? Do they fall into the social, educational, environmental, or some other realm?
- Which goals will be achieved through your project/plan?
- What is your initiative's target group?
- In which ways do people of generation 50+ participate in your project?
- What is innovative about your initiative?
- To what extent does your project strengthen the civic engagement of generation 50+? How does your idea contribute to the meaningful implementation of the knowledge and abilities of the elderly?
- How does your project relate to North America? Is your project inspired by an initiative from the U.S. or Canada?
Step 3: Organization of the initiative
In the first four points of step 3, we are interested in who will participate in your project: who is actively engaged and whom does the engagement benefit? Consider also the extent of the participation of generation 50+ and to what amount the initiative is supported by voluntary civic engagement.
Timetable
Please specify briefly the current implementation stage of your initiative. This information helps the jury determine how concrete and structured your project planning is.
Financial planning
Please describe how the prize money would be used. This information is important to determine how precise and realistic your financial planning is.
Perspectives
At this point, please take a brief look into the future. Will your project exist in the long term (and perhaps later be able to pay for itself) or is it planned from the outset as an initiative with a limited time span? Do you think similar needs exist elsewhere and your project would find emulators? Assess to what extent your initiative can lastingly improve societal cooperation.
Step 4: File upload
Here you have the possibility to upload additional documents.
Step 5: Review and completion
Click on "Submit application" to complete your online application. Up until the entry deadline, you may login into your account at any time using your username and password in order to edit your information and documents. After every time you change and save data online, you receive an e-mail with an overview of the current information in your account.
Good luck!
In the event of any further questions, please phone the project team at 040 80 81 92 167 or send an e-mail to usable[ at ]koerber-stiftung.de.
