Detailed Expression of Interest Notes

Please be as clear as you can at this stage about the activity you’d like to deliver, giving us a short, clear overview of your proposal.

Be clear and concise, telling us what your idea is, how it will happen, who with, and where. For example: ‘A festival of theatre celebrating Shakespeare linked to the secondary school curriculum, in which youth drama groups will perform various works of Shakespeare in school and community settings, culminating in a Shakespeare Medley performance at Rotherham Civic Theatre.’

Our Festival Year activity is primarily focused on activity taking place within the Rotherham borough. We can also consider digital / online activity that therefore has no ‘fixed’ location.

Activity delivery that solely or primarily takes place outside of the Rotherham borough cannot be considered as part of our Festival Year programme.

Please provide the address and the postcodes if available.

The Rotherham borough covers 111 square miles, which are divided into 25 electoral wards. We often work in a ‘ward-based’ way, so it can be helpful to tell us which ward(s) you plan to work in at this stage.. A ward map of Rotherham can be found here. You can also identify which ward an address is in by using the Write To Them website.

It’s fine for this figure to be a “best guesstimate” at this stage.

It might be helpful to divide this number into ‘active participants’ (this would cover the number of people you expect to directly participate in things like creative workshops, performances, or sports events, as well as the young people involved in co-producing your activity), ‘audience members’ (the number of people watching or visiting the festival, exhibition, installation, performance, or sports event you’re planning), and ‘volunteers’ (the number of people volunteering during any aspect of the activity’s development and delivery).

We know that some activities may only reach some of these audience segments (for example, you might be running a workshop programme that reaches active participants, but no audience members), and that’s fine!

All Children’s Capital of Culture activities are designed and delivered by children and young people from Rotherham. As such, it’s important to be clear in your Expression of Interest form about how children or young people will significantly and meaningfully contribute to the planning and/or delivery of your proposed activity.

What this “looks like” is varied, but may include things like:

• Consulting with children and young people to find out about their ideas and interests, and developing activities that respond to their thoughts
• Children and young people sitting on commissioning and/or interview panels
• Working with youth advisory boards, school councils, or other formal youth-led decisionmaking groups to steer and develop your activity
• Employing young people to codeliver the project as staff members or freelancers
• Your activity showcasing the work of children and young people (for example: an exhibition of children’s artwork; performances by young dance groups; a large sports event involving youth sports groups; etc)
• Children or young people working collaboratively with an artist to generate creative ideas, which the artist then turns into a finished piece of artwork.

If you would like to discuss how your activity could involve children and young people in planning and delivery prior to submitting your Expression of Interest form, please contact us to arrange an enquiry call with a Children’s Capital of Culture team member.

Please tell us more about your understanding of, and response to, the different needs that your expected participants and audience members might have.

In your answer, we would hope to see a thoughtful consideration of the wide range of different people who might engage with your activity, the barriers they might have to participation, and the clear, practical steps you will take to removing or reducing those barriers. It is helpful if you can give specific examples of the actions you will take to try and help different people fully participate.

Through in-depth consultation and engagement with local children and young people about what matters to them, Children’s Capital of Culture have developed four programming themes that will shape the 2025 creative programme.

To be considered as part of the 2025 programme, your activity must respond to at least one of these four themes. We suggest that responding to one or two of the themes, rather than three or four, will enable you to deliver an activity that focuses more clearly on the priorities that have been identified by children and young people.

In your answer to this question, please clearly outlining the specific ways in which your proposed activity responds to or aligns your chosen programming theme(s).

If you would like to discuss the programming themes and how they fit with your activity ideas prior to submitting your Expression of Interest form, please email ccoc@rotherham.gov.uk to arrange an enquiry call with a Children’s Capital of Culture team member.

This might include:

• Core funds / organisational income you plan to dedicate towards delivering this activity
• Grants you have applied to deliver this activity, or hope to apply to
• Funds raised through sponsorship activity or other similar forms of fundraising
• Funds raised through revenue sources such as ticket sales, refreshments sales, etc.

When setting pricing for commercial tickets we request that delivery partners consider the following:

• Rothercard discount to be considered as part of the pricing strategy; details can be found here: Rothercard – Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council
•  Where the Rothercard discount cannot be accommodated due to financial constraints, ensuring that there are pricing structures that account for children and families e.g., staggered pricing for child tickets, adult tickets and family packages that make the event more accessible for the target group of children and young people
• Making an appropriate provision of free tickets available for target groups identified in the Children’s Capital of Culture Equalities Impact Assessment, including Looked After Children, Care Leavers and other marginalised groups
• Making provision of at least two tickets and one chaperone for Young Inspectors and/or Young Critics to attend and review events in the programme
• Considering additional social value opportunities such as work placements or traineeships for young people as part of your delivery

For example, this might include:

• topics where there could be a risk of raising negative press or social media coverage that could adversely impact on the children and/or young people involved
• topics where you anticipate that there might be very polarised and/or challenging opinions, which, again, you would need to consider how to navigate for the best experience for children and young people involved
• topics that might be triggering or otherwise challenging to engage with for some participants

Children and young people in Rotherham have set us a bold mandate, and we know that they want and need a space to have conversations that can be challenging. However, we want to work – as best we can! – to ensure this happens in a way that is thoughtful, and that protects and supports the young people involved. The Children’s Capital of Culture team are keen to work with partners to enable this.