Skills for Safety Open Grant Call – Submission deadline: 14 September 2026, 11:00AM (BST)
The Engineering X Skills for Safety programme (formerly known as Engineering Skills where they are Most Needed) is focused on enabling high-quality skills programmes that strengthen safer engineering practices worldwide with a focus on Lower and Middle-Income Countries. We do this by building a strong evidence base, such as through the Global Engineering Capability Review (GECR) 2025, funding partners through open grant calls to enhance skills and safety culture and fostering global engagement through initiatives like our Engineering Skills for Safety Webinar series.
As most engineering safety issues occur in industry, we aim to develop sustainable collaborations with engineering industry partners who are committed to strengthening workforce skills and improving safety performance and culture across the organisation.
The third Skills for Safety open grant call scheme will support two project types: those that aim to scale existing interventions that strengthen engineering skills and capacity, and those which can strengthen and scale partnerships and collaboration mechanisms, all with the goal of achieving safer engineering outcomes.
Objectives and expected outcomes
Objective 1: To scale the impact of skills and safety initiatives, both those previously funded by us and others in the ecosystem
Expected outcomes include:
- Increased reach and uptake of proven skills and safety initiatives across additional sectors, stakeholder groups, organisations and/or countries
- Identification of pathways to long-term sustainability and wider scale beyond the project timeframe, including through further partnerships, investment, institutional adoption or through progress on policy, regulation or its implementation.
Objective 2: To scale partnerships and collaboration across key stakeholder groups as outlined in the GECR 2025
Expected outcomes include:
- New and stronger collaboration and partnerships that can drive safer outcomes, including within and across stakeholder groups, organisations and countries
- Creation of platforms, tools or other mechanisms to ensure long-term collaboration beyond the life of the grant
- Enhanced mechanisms for shared learning across organisations, stakeholder groups or countries
What do we mean by scaling?
By scaling, we mean expanding proven successful initiatives or partnerships to reach a broader range of stakeholders and enable wider adoption of products, approaches, knowledge and practices. The goal is to maximise the potential outcomes and impact of these initiatives, which in turn contributes to achieving the change outlined in the Skills for Safety Theory of Impact (available to download from the webpage). Scaling may involve expanding a successful initiative or partnership across an organisation, throughout the sector, or into new stakeholder groups, geographies and regions.
In addition, scaling may involve institutionalising successful standalone initiatives by influencing and embedding changes in policies, standards, regulations, enforcement mechanisms, curricula, and Continuing Professional Development (CPD) programmes, thereby ensuring long-term and sustainable impact.
For examples, see the Guidance Notes.
Project duration
Projects may last for a maximum of 15 months, commencing in December 2026 and ending no later than 28 February 2028. Please note that no extension will be considered, as the funding will end in March 2028.
Grant funding framework
We aim to award approximately £500,000, providing £25,000 - £50,000 per project, to organisations and consortia seeking to scale and embed initiatives and strengthen collaboration to enhance engineering skills and safety. Funding is available to deliver activities that directly support the grant’s objectives as follows:
- £25,000 projects: for individual organisations aiming to scale skills and safety initiatives and collaborations. Matched funding is not mandatory but encouraged to demonstrate contribution and leveraged investment from other sources.
- £50,000 projects (Consortia): organisations working in partnership can apply for £50k to deliver projects with greater scope that could lead to potential systematic changes across the ecosystem. Matched funding of up to 20% of the total project budget is required. For example, a project that costs £60,000 total would need £10,000 of matched funding support to attract a £50,000 grant.
Eligibility
- The lead applicant institution must be an organisation based in one of the Skills for Safety eligible countries for funding. For details, please refer to applicant guidance notes page 11.
- Project applications requesting up to £50,000 must include at least one co-applicant from a different organisation that may be based in the same country or another Skills for Safety eligible country for funding.
- For Consortia projects, the project lead, one of the co-applicants or collaborator must represent engineering industry.
- All projects must clearly align with one or more of the two grant objectives.
How to apply?
To apply for the grant, all applications must be submitted via the Academy’s online Grant Management System (GMS). The lead applicant must first register with GMS. They must provide basic details to create a profile.
After logging in to the GMS via the Academy’s website and selecting the Skills for Safety Open Grant Call, you should be presented with the “Instructions” screen where you will see some general instructions on how to use the system.
For further details about the grant call and how to apply, please refer to the following documents:
Grant information sessions
If you have any questions , or would like support in finding a potential partner, please register to attend one of the grant information and matchmaking sessions on: