The HCTF Board met last weekend to review and make funding decisions on over 200 enhancement proposals seeking 2015-16 funding. A Preliminary List of Approved Projects is now available here.

Attention HCTF Project Leaders! We are approaching the end of the 2014-15 Grant Year and annual Grant Reports are due March 31^st. We have updated the Grant Report form and it is now available. Please use this form for preparing and submitting your 2014-15 Grant Reports. This form can also be used for projects with contract extensions from last year.

This is a transition year to the new format, so if you have already submitted your 2014-15 Grant Report on the old form, that’s okay.

Feedback welcome!

The new report form is designed to more closely reflect the HCTF Online Enhancement proposal form. If you have any questions, comments or suggestions on the form or on the instructions that would help us improve it in the future, please let us know.

Multi-Year Reports

We are also revising the HCTF Multi-Year Report forms over the next few months, and will post on our blog once complete. Check back soon!

Missed HCTF’s Winter e-newsletter? It’s now posted on our Newsletter Archives page.

The spring edition will be sent out in late April to coincide with our official 2015 project funding announcement.

Sign up here to have future HCTF newsletters delivered right to your inbox.

This year, we made some improvements to our online application system. Before going live, we tested the system with a team of HCTF applicants drawn from a range of sectors (government, NGOs, independent consultants, etc.). This testing process drove further refinements to the application system, which went live on September 17^th, 2014.

In December (as a follow-up), we invited all HCTF applicants to participate in a survey to better understand their experiences with the online application system. 50% of those individuals completed the survey, providing detailed information and some great suggestions that will help us streamline our HCTF Online process for next year.

We haven’t analyzed all of the details yet, but we can give you a quick summary of the feedback we received on the overall application experience:

• 60% of respondents found the application to be easy. If there were any problems, they were resolved quickly.
• 23.8% described the experience as moderate. Although problems were resolved, it took some effort and time.
• 16.2% found the application process difficult, requiring more time and effort to troubleshoot and resolve the issues.

Some issues were relatively widespread, others were more specific to individual circumstances. In general, problems were most often caused by one or more of the following:

• Type and version of browser used to access the form. Google Chrome appeared to work best.
• Type and version of operating system used.
• Type and speed of internet connection, and the presence of network settings in larger organizations (such as government offices). Satellite connections were not compatible.
• Program timing out.

Thank you again to all who applied to HCTF this year, and for your valuable feedback – both in the survey and in personal correspondence to HCTF. We will be reviewing the feedback and making refinements to the system, and we look forward to improving HCTF On-Line in time for this fall’s application intake!

BC educators and schools have until February 15th to apply for a Get Outdoors (GO) Grant. These grants provide funding for activities that connect K-12 students with the outdoors and support hands-on learning experiences about the environment. Last year, HCTF Education awarded more than 70 GO grants totaling over $100,000 to get 7650+ students learning outdoors. For more information on grant criteria and how to apply, click here.

February 2^nd has the distinction of being both Groundhog and World Wetlands Day.

Across North America this morning, people tuned in to find out if representative members of the species Marmota monax would spot their shadows, foretelling another six weeks of winter weather. You can see the results of the groundhog’s prognostications here. Though British Columbia is lacking its own furry celebrity forecaster, it would seem we’re not missing much: an analysis of the accuracy of predictions by legendary groundhog forecaster Punxsutawney Phil using meteorological data from 1969 onward revealed a success rate of only 36%. Besides, BC’s groundhogs are still likely to be fast asleep, typically waiting to emerge from their deep winter slumber until March, or even later. Their cousins, the endangered Vancouver Island Marmot, often don’t emerge until May!

While it may be fruitless to go searching for groundhogs at this time of year, there’s no reason not to get outdoors and celebrate World Wetlands Day. February 2^nd also marks the date of the adoption of the Convention on Wetlands, back in 1971 in the Iranian city of Ramsar. The Ramsar Convention is an intergovernmental treaty that provides a framework for the conservation and wise use of wetlands. Wetlands make up approximately 6% of BC, and provide critical habitat for fish, birds, and other wildlife. Indeed, most of the province’s wildlife use wetlands at some stage their life cycle, and many of our at-risk species are wetland-dependent. Each year, HCTF provides grants to many projects working to restore wetlands in BC, including the Ducks Unlimited Canada’s Wetlands Partnership Program.