FPA Travel Grants

Travel grants to help FreeCAD developers and community members attend real-world events and meetings

Note: The FPA has voted a new travel policy, which term also apply here.

The FreeCAD project association (FPA) is offering travel grants to help developers and community members attend different events where they can meet other developers and users. Grants are intended to help cover travel and hotel expenses and will be awarded based on the following criteria.

The Program

• The FPA seeks to provide financial assistance to FreeCAD community members traveling to events where they can meet other developers.
• The FPA will only issue grants for the events listed below.
• The FPA will issue grants up to a maximum of USD 600 per person and will spend a maximum of USD 6000 in total.
• The grant amount is USD 600 or the price of your travel, whichever is lower.

Events covered by this program

• Open: FOSDEM and FreeCAD day 2025 - 28 jan to 02 feb 2025 - USD 600 grants, up to max USD 6000
• Closed: FOSDEM and FreeCAD day 2024 - 30 jan to 05 feb 2024 - USD 600 grants, up to max USD 6000
• Closed: Vancouver hackathon 2023 - 11 to 15 aug 2023 - USD 500 grants, up to max USD 5000
• Closed: FOSDEM and FreeCAD day 2023 - 02 to 04 feb 2023. USD 500 grants, up to max USD 5000

Potential Events

The FPA will continue to expand this program. The FPA will authorize travel grant money on a event-by-event basis by a regular vote of the general assembly. The criteria considered generally include:

• Is the event generally recognized as a legitimate gathering of FOSS developers and users
• Will there be a significant representation of FreeCAD or CAD/Design users
• Will representation by FreeCAD developers and users generally benefit the FreeCAD community by, for example clarifying requirements, increasing contributions, increasing donations, or building collaboration
• Will a lack of representation by FreeCAD developers or community members be detrimental to FreeCAD in any way.
• Is someone within the FreeCAD community willing to lead and organize FreeCAD participation

We welcome suggestions for events that we can consider. Some suggestions that have already been received but not yet autorized include:

• OSHWA summit
• IndiaFOSS
• PyCon India
• FOSS Hacks

Who is Eligible

• Any person listed under “The team” on the FreeCAD forum is eligible automatically.
• Any person with an approved FreeCAD-related talk at FOSDEM or any conference happening inside the above events is eligible automatically.
• Any other FreeCAD community member not fitting in the above categories may apply for a grant, but only candidates with significant contributions to FreeCAD will be considered by the FPA. FPA members will decide upon each case individually based on criteria including volume of code contributions as well as duration and extent of community participation.
• Grants will be issued on a first-come, first-served basis.
• Any person interested must request a grant: no grant will be awarded automatically. All requests will be considered and must be approved by the FPA.
• Requests must be submitted by sending an email to the FPA at fpa@freecad.org no later than December 31st, 2022.

Be sure to read the FPA travel policy as its terms apply here as well.

How can the money be used?

• The grant must be solely used for travel to the designated event, and for stay (hotel, etc) expenditures related to the event.
• Candidates must submit proof of travel expenses to the FPA (e.g. a train or plane ticket) in order to obtain a grant.
• If travel by train is available„ train should be used preferably instead of plane. The FPA will deliberate over cases that don’t follow this guideline.

When do I get the money?

It might take some time to process payments. We will do our best to process payments as quickly as possible but grant recipients will pay for their ticket upfront and receive reimbursement.

How to apply?

• Read the FPA travel policy

• Fill the request form at least 30 days before the start of the event

How to help

Even if you can’t attend, you can help someone else go. Any donation to the FPA labeled or otherwise communicated to the FPA as “travel grant” will increase the total maximum amount to be spent commensurately.

Finally, as money is limited and this is the first time such action is organized, we ask potential applicants to be conscious of others’ financial need, and leave as much as possible the money for those who most need it.

We look forward to meeting you at the next event!

Updated on 2023.12.05