Rediscover Your Heart Award Criteria, Moscow 2010

The Rediscover Your Heart Awards (Moscow,  2010) are for projects (or ideas for projects!) that are empowering, inspiring and replicable and which will help to improve the community and/or the lives of others in the Russian Federation. Young people especially are encouraged to apply, although there is no age limit for these Awards.

A series of Rediscover Your Heart Awards of 70,000 Roubles each will be offered to the most inspiring and innovative of these projects, as determined by the selection panel made up of representatives from the Fred Foundation and the Raisa Gorbachev Foundation.

Final decisions will be made by the end of March 2010 and the RYH Awards will be presented at ta special ceremony in Moscow, in April 2010 (full details and date to be announced soon).

Projects may be community-based, humanitarian, environmental, educational, health-orientated, creative or whatever – there is no restriction on the type of project - but the following qualities are sought:

Empowerment: The project should empower individuals or groups enabling them to make inspirational changes in their own lives and/or their communities.

Creativity: The project should embody originality and creativity. It may incorporate a new twist for an old idea or an adaptation of something from one culture to another. Ideally it will strike the imagination and inspire others to get involved.

Replicability: The project should be relatively simple, practical and easy to implement, so that others may be inspired to repeat it elsewhere around the globe. Ideally the project will be realisable within a 3-6 month time frame, although some may take longer.

Commitment: There should be evidence of the commitment that the applicant(s) bring(s) to the project, for example in the form of time and effort invested, the securing of matched funding from other sources, ‘people power’, or other indications. The selection committee will be looking for heart(s), mind(s), hands and feet in the project!

Fun: Ideally projects will contain an element of fun and will help to spread ‘miles of smiles’ around the globe.

Community/Population Served: Projects must take place in the Russian Federation and serve Russian populations/communities. Preference will be given to projects in the greater Moscow area but others from further afield will also be considered

Selection will be  based on the extent to which applications embody  the qualities outlined above and  the principles outlined in Fred Matser’s book Rediscover Your Heart:7 Keys for Personal and Planetary Transformation. No individual or group is allowed to submit more than one application. All applications will be scrutinised for authenticity and realistic achievement and references will be followed up for short-listed applicants. The award panel’s choice of awardees' projects will be final.