Coronavirus/Covid-19 : Resources for Museums
At MDEM we want to provide as much information as possible for museums in the region dealing with the evolving Coronavirus/Covid-19 situation. As such we have created a round up of resources which you may find useful and will try and update these as frequently as possible.
For the most up-to-date support offers to museums, please sign up to our e-newsletter. You can see the latest edition below:
Current Information on the virus:
For up-to-date advice and guidance from Public Health England’s please click here here
Supporting the Workforce:
The NHS Coronavirus pages contain the very latest advice and guidance, including preventative measures and responses to common questions.
Many individuals in our region’s workforce are aged over 70. Age UK have a very useful resource for older people which is also helpful if you are caring for or working with an older person.
The NCVO have some excellent guidance on how to safeguard your workforce, and some practical advice around HR issues such as sick pay.
We have put together some initial resources to support remote volunteering which you may also want to explore.
Business Resilience:
The Association of Independent Museums has practical guidance, including a ‘Business Resilience Checklist’ which we’d recommend all museums take a look at.
AIM partners, Charity Finance Group (CFG) have put together a practical guide for charity finance professionals covering business continuity planning, cashflow management and insurance. Read the resources
Information on the contractual implications of cancelling events or AGMs etc can be found on the Bates Wells website.
South East Museum Development have put together these useful resources to assess and manage the organisational risk. We would recommend you look at these documents as a reference to creating your own plans, policies and procedures.
- Coronavirious – Example of Risk assessment by Hastings Museum Covid-19
- Coronavirus Pandemic Plan by Chatham Historic Dockyards Trust
- Pandemic Planning – Departmental Analysis and Impact Assessment – Chatham Historic Dockyards Trust
We have also collated a list of digital resources which feature remote volunteering, digital programming (including learning opportunities) and use of social media.
Message from Arts Council England’s (ACE)
Funding for organisations outside of the National Portfolio: £50 million will be made available to organisations that are not in receipt of regular funding from the Arts Council. Organisations who have applied to National Lottery Project Grants are welcome to apply for this support. More information
Funding for individuals: We want to support artists, creative practitioners and freelancers as best we can in this crisis. We’re making £20 million of financial support available to individuals, so they can better sustain themselves, and their work, in the coming months.More information
Funding for National Portfolio Organisations: We will be making £90 million available to NPOs. We hope organisations will use this funding to reboot their creative work, but we also understand it may be required to alleviate financial pressures on NPOs. More information
Message from the National Heritage Lottery fund:
We are making £50million available for a Heritage Emergency Fund to support the UK heritage sector as an immediate response to the coronavirus (COVID-19) crisis.
We will be investing the £50m where it is needed most, by providing short-term funding for organisations delivering heritage projects or running previously funded projects, and safeguarding heritage sites we have previously invested in to ensure they are not lost to the public.
The Heritage Emergency Fund will be available as:
- A fund that organisations can access over the next three-six months as short-term funding to stabilise operations and manage unforeseen risks. Grants of between £3,000-£50,000 will be available.
- A select number of key strategic investments where heritage is identified as at greatest risk. This could include grant increases to funded projects that are currently underway.
In addition, we are also supporting the heritage sector by:
- Enabling organisations that have received grant funding and are currently delivering projects to delay or change the way the projects are delivered. This can include changes to approved purposes, flexibility on costs within a project, early drawdown of grant payment, a relaxation of some conditions of the grant, and flexible use of contingency funding.
- Providing bespoke advice and support via our local teams and in some cases, via our specialist network of mentors.
- Accelerating the provision of our £1.2m Digital Skills for Heritage initiative to help the sector through the crisis and beyond. This will include support for organisations to run activities and events, reach audiences, engage volunteers, share content and fundraise online.
- For the longer term, to help with recovery from the current crisis, we have invested £4m in two Enterprise Development programmes for heritage leaders across the UK, and Business Support Programmes in all four countries. More information will be available in due course.
Decisions on awards under the Heritage Emergency Fund will be made as quickly as possible to support the sector. Awards will be made on the basis of a set of criteria to identify those with the greatest need.
Find out more in our Heritage Emergency Fund news story. Hear from our Executive Director of Business Delivery, Eilish McGuinness. And visit their website for more information on how to apply.
MDEM Team:
Currently we have decided to postpone all our upcoming training in March and April 2020. This will be reviewed before May and a decision will then be taken on further events. You can view our current position statement here. We are running online training and support -visit our training section to see what is coming up.
We will also be available remotely to support museums in any area of their organisation. This includes helping museums return to ‘business as usual’ as soon as possible, but also some extra programming and resources to help over the coming weeks. Below are our contacts if you would like to email or call us. Please note the team work part-time so you may want to email in the first instance:
Claire Browne – Regional Programme Manager: Claire.Browne@leics.gov.uk T: 07973 800 072
Sarah Hartshorne – Programme Officer: Sarah.Hartshorne@leics.gov.uk T: 0116 305 8118
Heather Lomas – Organisational Health Consultant and Museum Accreditation Advisor office@heatherlomas.co.uk T: 07809 771066
Anita Hollinshead – Regional Collections Advisor and Emergency Risk Network Facilitator anitahollinshead@hotmail.com T: 07876 166 742
Laura Hughes – Project Officer Laura.Hughes@leics.gov.uk T: 0116 305 3118
