Working with Culture Forward

• Do you have an idea in development and would like to know if we are leading research in that area?
• Are you working on a project and are keen to connect with researchers to expand its remit or reach?
• Do you have a funding submission in the works and you are seeking letters of support or expert advocates?
• Are you planning a bid and looking for co-partners?

If so, then Culture Forward can:

• Introduce you to our internationally renowned researchers and research institutes, follow up and develop these connections for you.
• Make bespoke introductions between you and academic colleagues who are seeking research partners with your expertise, skills and contacts.
• Share relevant research bid opportunities with you for you to explore and develop.
• Create letters of support and identify appropriate academic advocates to enhance your funding bids.
• Bring you and other members together as a consortium to workshop and shape funding submissions that the University is keen to pursue.

Please do explore the University’s research objectives, and those of the College of Arts and Law, as these will provide a useful indication of how we are strategically focusing our research activity.

• Are you looking for new ideas or fresh perspectives in your organisation?
• Could you benefit from additional support to scope a project, grow your business or deliver a programme?
• Do you want to help shape the future talent pipeline for the cultural, creative and community sectors?

Culture Forward works closely with the University’s Careers Network Team to create and share opportunities for you to host our students and graduates on work experience and career development programmes. These include:

• B-Experienced Internships scheme: the University’s flagship work experience programme, providing our students and graduates with the opportunity to enhance their employability skills and further prepare them for their future career.
• Culture Forward Internships: ring-fenced specifically to Culture Forward members to host and provide students with the chance to develop their skills and knowledge in the cultural, creative and community sectors.
• Professional Skills Module: specific to the College of Arts and Law, this enables students to develop their professional skills, knowledge and confidence by undertaking a work experience placement as part of their degree.
• Public History and Heritage Placements: specific to our History and Cultures students, this gives them the chance to work with industry professionals to design, plan and manage their own public history projects as part of their degree.

Additionally, members are approached and invited to take part in careers fairs and other career development opportunities for our students and graduates.

Members can also post job and voluntary opportunities to the University’s Careers Connect platform, free for organisations to register and advertise vacancies.

• Do you have an upcoming project or venture that students could work on as part of their degree programme?
• Could students help provide you with valuable solutions to organisational challenges?
• Do you have past examples of scenarios or situations that you could share with our students to enhance their career knowledge and understanding?

Culture Forward works with our Digital Media, Communications, and Cultural and Creative Studies module convenors to secure industry partners to provide live briefs and case studies for student small groups to workshop:

• Case studies: hypothetical or historic projects and challenges that can be kept as a bank of opportunities for students to use to expand their knowledge and skills of industry practice in culture, heritage, the arts, creative and community sectors.
  
  
• Live briefs: organisations can pitch live or forthcoming business challenges and projects to student groups, who will work on them and feedback their ideas, solutions and outputs. Live briefs not only give students invaluable chances to work directly on real-world activities, they also give industry practical ideas and outcomes they can take away and use.

• Are you interested in celebrating your community’s cultural heritage as part of a wider programme of activity?
• Do you want to explore an activity to commemorate culture or art as part of a national or international observance?
• Are you looking to do something to mark a local festival or civic celebration?

Culture Forward works closely with the University’s staff networks, student societies, and local communities, to collectively mark and celebrate civic, national and international events – such as the Birmingham Light Festival, Pride Month, and International Women’s Day – by exploring opportunities to platform our diverse, local cultural heritage.

We can:

• Secure academic speakers and panellists – across a wide portfolio of disciplines – for talks, presentations, Q&As, and other events.
• Make introductions to student societies you might wish to engage with.
• Promote your events and activities to our academic, professional services and student communities, and across the Culture Forward network.
• Explore venue ideas for your activity/event from across our membership.

In some cases, provide small amounts or seed or matched funding to enable activity or event delivery (depending on available resource and connections to University strategic objectives).

• Are you a freelancer or small organisation looking to expand your network?
• Do you have calls to action or news items you’re keen to share around as wide an audience as possible?
• Are you seeking better connections to other community, cultural or creative industries?

Culture Forward can support these aims through:

• Our weekly network e-newsletter - all members are invited to submit news, call-outs, event invites and other items for inclusion alongside Culture Forward programme and relevant University updates.
• Our annual programme of members’ events, including an annual reception, education-based event where students interact with member delegates, and research-themed sandpit events focused on relevant topics from creative health and sustainability to social justice and challenging inequalities.

Making introductions between different members, and brokering connections between members’ activities and projects