Community Innovation Practitioner Awards 2025-26

The AHRC Creative Communities programme is pleased to announce the Community Innovation Practitioner (CIP) Awards 2025-2026.

The awards provide innovative funding for cross-sector research partnerships to host a Community Innovation Practitioner (CIP) from 1 September 2025 to 30 August 2026. Up to 10 CIP awards will be offered at £75k (100% fEC). Each CIP should be embedded in existing collaborative cross-sector research projects in devolved contexts and be committed to capturing knowledge about co-creation and the roles of communities and partnerships in growing new cultural research, development and innovation (RD&I). 

The Community Innovation Practitioners (CIP) Awards 2025/2026 open with an initial call for expressions of interest (EoI). Your EoI application will outline your eligibility for an award and your proposal for use of the funding. If your EoI application is successful, you will be invited to progress to a full application in Spring 2025.

Those eligible to apply for this funding must: 

• Be based at a UK higher education institution (HEI) or independent research organisation (IRO) located in a devolved region or nation of the UK;
• Be working in partnership with diverse external partners, cross-sector collaborations and/or communities;
• Have planned projects of work featuring collaborative/co-creation R&D with funding until at least September 2026; 
• Identify a named individual as CIP candidate on the application;
• Actively engage in the co-design and co-authoring of the application with all partners, including the CIP candidate; 
• Outline a distinct piece of research activity to be led and completed by the CIP candidate;
• Provide a suitable package of support for the CIP, including managing the hosting and line management of the CIP within existing institutional frameworks and governance structures.  

Application Portal

Submit your Eligibility & EOI Application through the website or via Gecko directly.

Call Information

Community Innovation Practitioner (CIP) Awards 2025/2026 Call

Community Innovation Practitioner (CIP) Awards 2025/2026 Applicant Guide

Events

The Creative Communities team hosted a webinar to discuss this funding opportunity and answer questions on 13 November 2024 at 11am (UK time). This event included an introduction to the Creative Communities programme, the research to date, and the objectives of the CIP Awards. This was followed by a group question and answer session, which was not recorded.

Following the webinar, a recording of the event is available on the AHRC Creative Communities website or via our YouTube channel.