Space Placements in Industry (SPIN): Award scheme 2023
This Announcement of Opportunity closes at 5pm on 31 March 2023 (or earlier if all funds have been awarded)
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The UK Space Agency, supported by its delivery partner the Satellite Applications Catapult, is making at least £150,000 available under its ‘SPIN’ placement award scheme. Projects that seek to develop skills in the interns which are identified within the Space Sector Skills Survey are strongly encouraged. The projects should be suitable to be carried out by an undergraduate or postgraduate student in a relevant discipline over a period of 8 or more weeks in the summer (applicants must be registered with an educational establishment at the time of their application). The organisation can extend the intern’s placement beyond 8 weeks at their discretion and expense.
This is a competitive process which offers small grants up to a maximum of £3,750 for each award. The scheme is run to support the provision of paid work placements across the sector and to fulfil the skills and careers aims and objectives of the UK Space Agency’s inspiration programme.
This grant should not be viewed as a subsidy to your organisation (see Call Guidance for more details).
For this phase of the call, applications are welcome from all sizes of organisation as well as small and medium enterprises (SMEs), universities, charities, not-for-profits and UK government agencies that can propose an inspirational space-oriented project which will develop the skills that the sector needs in their future workforce.
This, in turn, supports the aims of the UK Space Agency by providing a context for students to experience the breadth of opportunities that the sector can offer, developing skills crucial to the success of the sector, supporting the growth of businesses within the sector and raising awareness of the UK’s space programme and STEM subjects in general.
We are delivering a SPIN Programme Industry Information Event on Monday 6 February from 4:30pm to 5:30pm. This event is for organisations looking to host an intern and will explain the SPIN Programme from start to finish, including how to apply for grant funding from the UK Space Agency, how the intern recruitment process works, and how best to support your intern once you’ve recruited. Please register through the Eventbrite line page and we will send you a Microsoft Teams invite in due course.
Please note, this event is not for students looking to apply for internship positions.
What projects are suitable?
Your project may be targeted at a student of a specific discipline, or simply describe the skills you are looking for. You may use it to highlight critical future skills that your business will require. It should outline a piece of work or role which will take a minimum of 8 weeks and be designed to enhance the skill set of the successful applicant, whilst providing them with a business context in which to apply their skills.
The placement will vary from organisation to organisation and may involve:
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a piece of research or a small project that would otherwise not be done
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working as part of a team on a product or client-focused project, or something more independent.
We anticipate the following schedule:
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received applications will be reviewed every two weeks by an evaluation panel, and successful applicants notified immediately. In parallel, the completed Advert Template will be forwarded to the Satellite Applications Catapult for upload to the SPIN recruitment webpages. We strongly encourage you to make use of the advice provided by the Space Skills Alliance in their ‘Recruitment Toolkit’;
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the final deadline for placement proposals, should funds not be exhausted before this, will be 5pm on 31 March 2023;
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projects will be advertised to students on the Satellite Applications Catapult’s SPIN website for 4 weeks;
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students’ applications will be sent to hosts immediately after the closing date for shortlisting and selection;
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we ask that all hosts review student applications immediately, make selections within 10 working days of closing date, and inform unsuccessful applicants within 15 working days. Please advise us of your selection and intern’s details, including name, email address and start date, as soon as possible so we can secure the internship through a grant funding agreement;
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all successful candidates will be invited to attend a SPIN Induction session on 19 June 2023;
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the SPIN Showcase Event 2023 will be held during the 2023 UK Space Conference in Belfast between 21 November to 23 November.
Email your SPIN application form, along with your SPIN project advert, to the email address below. You will receive a notification of your application being accepted within 48 hours of sending. If you do not receive this, we have probably not received your application.