We’re delighted to announce that our first round application to the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) to grow the CITiZAN project beyond its original three-year programme was successful.
In 2015, CITiZAN (Coastal and Intertidal Zone Archaeological Network) was awarded funding by the HLF. This three-year programme set out to train volunteers to record and monitor the at-risk archaeology of England’s coastlines and tidal estuaries. Match-funding was provided by the National Trust and The Crown Estate, with further support from Historic England.
CITiZAN has been hugely successful; engaging 9000 people, mobilising 583 new volunteer citizen scientists; delivering 350 free training sessions and public events; enabling 1500 new archaeological features to be added to the interactive coastal map, and submitting 2300 coastal erosion surveys and recently winning the 2018 Charity Award for Arts, Culture and Heritage.
This first round funding covers the development and piloting of a further three-year CITiZAN programme from now until August/ September 2018. During this period, a second-round application will be made to the HLF to secure support for the delivery of a new three-year programme (2019-2021). The outcome of this bid will be announced in early 2019. There will therefore be a hiatus in the project of a few months, from September until early 2019.
Gustav Milne, CITiZAN Project Leader, said: “We’re thrilled and hugely grateful to the Heritage Lottery Fund for giving us the opportunity to pilot a new model for CITiZAN.
Building on the amazing work that our CITiZAN volunteers have done over the last three years the proposed new Discovery Programmes and Responsible Stewardship initiatives will help us reach many more people, across a wide range of communities, and record much more of our threatened costal heritage before it’s washed away.”
We encourage volunteers to continue monitoring their local archaeological sites and to add data on these to the interactive coastal map. We will be in touch about the local pilot projects we are running over the summer and keep your eye peeled for updates on our social media channels.
We’d like to thank and congratulate everyone that has contributed to the CITiZAN project over the last three years: our dedicated and passionate CITiZAN archaeologists, the committed network of volunteers, our supporters, and our project partners at the Council for British Archaeology and Nautical Archaeology Society, and of course, to the National Lottery’s Heritage Lottery Fund for its support from 2015-2018.
Updates on future plans for the project will be communicated as these develop. Should you have any questions please get in touch with us at citizan@mola.org.uk. We look forward to continue working with you!
