Youth Solidarity Fund 2018

The Youth Solidarity Fund (YSF) supports youth-led organizations that foster peaceful and inclusive societies by providing direct funding to outstanding projects promoting intercultural and interfaith dialogue. Established in 2008, the Fund responded to calls for action made by youth-led organizations around the world on the importance of establishing funding mechanisms for youth. Today, the Fund is more relevant than ever: As the global agenda increasingly speaks of youth’s participation and contribution to peace, development and security, it is critical to support this participation and contribution through funding and partnership opportunities.

Eligibility criteria for youth organizations:
Youth organizations are subject to the same criteria as other partners of the United Nations System in that they must be accountable, transparent and refrain from all discriminatory practices.

To be eligible, applying youth organizations need to fulfill each and every one of the following criteria:

Be youth-led: a majority of the positions and decision-making roles within the organization are held by women and men between the ages of 18 and 35;
Be a non-profit, non-governmental organization (with the exception of national youth councils) registered in the country of operation as a charity, trust, foundation or association;
Be officially registered and operational for a minimum of 2 years at the time of the application with funding base and project implementation (e.g. registered in January 2016 or earlier);
Be registered and operate in one of the aforementioned countries;
Have a democratic governance structure and decision making mechanism, including consultative processes in formulating priorities and policies;
Have an ability to demonstrate proper and consistent monitoring, evaluation and record-keeping of their activities, including project evaluation reports and financial accounts;
Have a gender perspective/balance reflected in their staff, beneficiaries and activities;
Have no adherence to or affiliations with violent ideologies or antagonism against any particular country, culture, religion or belief system, ethnic group, gender, etc.; and
Did not receive funding under past editions of YSF or did not receive the Intercultural Innovation Award.
Note: If you applied to YSF in the past, but were not selected, you can apply to YSF again.

Upon request, organizations will need to provide documented evidence of how they fulfill all of these criteria.

Please note that project proposals will not be considered eligible for funding if they are submitted by: governments, international governmental organizations, non-youth led organizations, unregistered groups of youth, business entities, as well as individuals.

To apply:

Interested organizations can apply at the following link: http://apply.unaoc.org/

In order to be considered complete and valid, the application package must include the following and be submitted through the online application system available at http://apply.unaoc.org/

The application form, completed and certified by the applicant organization;
A copy of the registration certificate of the applicant organization;
A copy of the statutes/by-laws of the applicant organization;
An organizational chart, depicting the ages of key decision makers within the organization;
A biography of the current Executive/Managing Director, showing date of birth (1 page maximum);
The resume/CV of the project coordinator (2 pages maximum);
A picture or scan of the project coordinator’s passport identification page. If the project coordinator does not have an international passport, upload his or her national identification card.
Word/character limit for each question in the application form needs to be respected. The application system automatically counts words and characters.

The application deadline is 16 February 2018, 5:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time (New York).