Project Criteria

PROJECT SELECTION CRITERIA

Projects are commissioned against national priorities in support of English Heritage's Strategy for 2000-2010 and informed by the broader agendas set our for English Heritage and the historic environment sector as a whole in Power of Place: the Future of the Historic Environment (English Heritage 2000) and The Historic Environment: a Force for our Future (DCMS 2001).

Detailed priorities are currently set out in Strategic Framework for Historic Environment Activities and Programmes in English Heritage (SHAPE). SHAPE meshes our Corporate Objectives with our Research Strategy. some projects are further commissioned against priorities set out in detailed strategy documents for specific policy and research areas such as those currently available for the marine and coastal historic environment.

The demand for project funding constantly outstrips the resources available to the Historic Environment Enabling Programme and so we can only commission projects which directly address our main strategic priorities. The following factors, enshrined in SHAPE, may also be taken into account when deciding whether or not to commission a project although it is not expected that any single project will meet all of these criteria: 

• develops and supports best practice?
• addresses key questions identified in regional and national research frameworks?
• promotes best management of the historic environment?
• provides effective training and professional development?
• promotes public interest and involvement through participation and outreach?
• brings partnership funding?
• encourages partnerships or inter-disciplinary working?
• encourages synthetic analysis?
• develops or employs innovative approaches to data-collection, analysis and dissemination?

Please note that because of budgetary constraints we are not currently commissioning any new backlog projects  nor can we fund the preservation by record of archaeological sites threatened by erosion or agricultural activity.