LMS Grants

Objectives: Grants are made to the organisers of conferences to be held in the United Kingdom.

Eligibility: Any mathematician based in the UK is eligible to apply for a grant, but if the applicant is not a member of the Society then the application must be countersigned by a member who is prepared to support the application. Applications should be made by one of the organisers of the conference.

Criteria: Programme Committee tends to give priority to the support of meetings where an LMS grant can be expected to make a significant contribution to the viability and success of the meeting. The Society expects that the meetings which it supports will be open to all, and will only support a closed meeting if an exceptional case is made. Support of larger meetings of high quality is not ruled out, but for such meetings an LMS grant will normally cover only a modest part of the total cost. Potential applicants should note that the Society is reluctant to award grants to conferences which clash with other significant mathematical meetings in Britain such as the British Mathematical Colloquium or the British Applied Mathematics Colloquium.

Applications for postgraduate research conferences should be submitted under Scheme 8 (Postgraduate Research Conferences)
The Committee will often find it difficult to fund the full amount asked for.
Reasonable registration fees of between £10 and £20 per day should be charged.
The Committee will support only mathematical meetings or the mathematical component of wider meetings, and here the word mathematical excludes mathematics education.
The Society does not like to receive sequential applications for grants to support the same or closely related events, and will not allow its limits for individual schemes to be exceeded by artificially sub-dividing an application into a number of separate requests under different headings.

Applicants should note that conference attendance will not be funded, except for (a) principal speakers, (b) research students, and (c) participants from Africa and countries in which mathematics is in a similar position (which we refer to as Scheme 5 countries) or former Soviet Union countries. Support here is intended to contribute to travel, accommodation and subsistence costs, but not registration fees. The application should include the name, institution and area of expertise of the speakers for whom funding is requested.

The Society will not make grants to cover the cost of secretarial help or publicity. The Society does not normally make grants to cover room hire, except that consideration will be given to requests for grants to cover room hire charges at De Morgan House where special circumstances can be shown. Reasonable visa costs are regarded as part of normal travel expenses.

The Society wishes to support research students (of any nationality) studying at UK universities, and applications should include details of the extent to which research students will be involved in the conference. Up to £1,000 may be awarded to support such research students.

The Society also wishes to encourage overseas participants from Scheme 5 or former Soviet Union countries; a further £1,000 may be awarded to support such participants.

Value of award: The overall upper limit for grants is £6,000. This is normally made up of:

A basic grant which is primarily intended to cover the expenses of principal speakers (up to £4,000)
Support for research students (£1,000)
Support for participants from Scheme 5 or former Soviet Union countries (£1,000).

The limits mentioned are upper bounds, not standard awards. Grants are made to meet actual expenditure on items in the application, and any surplus must be returned to the Society as soon as possible and may not be used for other purposes.

Form of application: Application forms may be obtained from the Society’s Office or may be downloaded here in RTF or PDF format. Applications should be set out clearly, and preferably typed. They should be self-contained; please do not append substantial documents that contain irrelevant detail or refer to websites for key information. Please send all applications in hard copy to the Programme Secretary at De Morgan House .

Queries regarding applications can be addressed to the Programme Secretary, Stephen Huggett (tel: 01752 586869) or Sylvia Daly (tel: 020 7291 9971, Wednesday-Friday), who will be pleased to discuss proposals informally with potential applicants and give advice on the submission of an application.

Checklist: Applicants may like to note the following general checklist used by the Committee when assessing applications:

Mathematical quality of the project.
Well argued proposal, with a clear statement of the mathematical component in the case of a wider project.
Well thought out and cost-effective budget, with the request restricted to allowable costs, and an appropriate and clearly identified balance of funding from other sources and the registration fee.
The difference made by our grant to the viability and success of a project.
Likely beneficiaries, in particular research students, participants from Africa, and countries in which mathematics is in a similar position, or participants from countries of the former Soviet Union.
Compliance with the Society’s policy on Women in Mathematics and expectations of those seeking grants.
Limitation on the number of grants awarded to any individual or department.
Sufficient time available for publicity for the event.
Receipt of satisfactory reports on previous grants.

Deadlines and decision timetable: Applications are considered at the October, February and June meetings of Programme Committee. Deadlines for receipt of applications for these meetings are 15th September, 31st January and 15th May. Applications will only be considered between these deadlines in exceptional circumstances. However, please note that applications will not be considered between mid-June and mid-October. The deadline for notices for the Newsletter is the first day of the month preceding that in which you wish the notice to appear, but please note that there is no Newsletter in August.

Scheme 1 - Conference Grants