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Introduction

About the Foundation

The Nuffield Foundation is one of the UK's best known charitable trusts which was established in 1943 by William Morris (Lord Nuffield), the founder of Morris Motors.

Lord Nuffield wanted his Foundation to 'advance social well being', particularly through research and practical experiment. The Foundation aims to achieve this by supporting work which will bring about improvements in society, and which is founded on careful reflection and informed by objective and reliable evidence.

The Foundation's income (around £9m a year) comes from the returns on its investments. It does not fund-raise, or receive money from the Government. The Foundation's financial independence and lack of vested interests helps to ensure an impartial and even-handed approach to problems in the projects it funds.

Most of the Foundation's income is spent on grants some of which are for research and others support practical innovation or development, often in voluntary sector organisations. In both cases the preference is for work that has wide significance, beyond the local or routine. The Foundation looks to support projects that are imaginative and innovative, take a thoughtful and rigorous approach to problems, and have the potential to influence policy or practice.

The Foundation also runs a number of grant programmes that are targeted towards specific purposes. Some provide support for scientists and social scientists at the early stages of their careers; others support particular kinds of projects or people.

Finally, the Foundation sets up and runs projects of its own. The two largest are The Nuffield Council on Bioethics (which is jointly funded with the Wellcome Trust and the Medical Research Council), and The Nuffield Curriculum Centre. The most recent is The Nuffield Adolescent Mental Health Initiative - a specific programme of research on time trends in adolescent mental health, set up by The Nuffield Foundation in 2005.

The Nuffield Languages Programme, which finished in December 2003, has an archived website which you have access to here

Last Updated Fri, 2 March 2007