Rules & Guidelines

Thank You for Your interest in applying to the Bellagio Center Residency Program (the “Residency Program”). The Residency Program is sponsored by The Rockefeller Foundation with platform support provided by Carrot. The Application Rules are stated here as an extension of the Terms and Conditions (“TERMS”) for use of this website and contain terms that are specific to the Application process and/or Applicants (as opposed to, e.g., casual visitors of the website). The full TERMS are available for Your review by accessing them on this Website. Capitalized words used but not defined in the Application Rules have the meanings given to them in the TERMS.

Please read these Application Rules and the TERMS carefully, as they describe the conditions under which You are allowed to submit an Application. As You apply and continue to participate in the Application process, You may periodically be asked to recognize Your acceptance of these Application Rules and the TERMS by clicking “accept” at various pages on this website, but by continuing any use of this website You expressly consent to all of these Application Rules and the TERMS.

SUBMISSION OF AN APPLICATION TO THE RESIDENCY PROGRAM CONSTITUTES FULL AND UNCONDITIONAL AGREEMENT TO AND ACCEPTANCE OF THESE APPLICATION RULES AND THE TERMS.

1. Eligibility

The Rockefeller Foundation welcomes Applications from qualified individuals over the age of 18 years from anywhere in the world. Successful Applicants must demonstrate significant professional contributions to their field over the course of their career. An individual can submit only one Application.

2. Ineligible Persons

The following individuals may not apply:

United States government officials as defined by the Internal Revenue Service;
Individuals who are or would be officials in public office in countries outside of the United States during the residency;
Candidates for public office or individuals who are working on a campaign for a political candidate during the residency;
Individuals who have had a residency at the Bellagio Center within the last five years;
Individuals who have had two prior residencies at the Bellagio Center. Individuals may not have more than two residencies within their lifetime;
Rockefeller Foundation personnel and their Related Parties;

“Foundation Personnel” includes all trustees, officers and staff of the Foundation, as well as non-trustee members of the Investment Committee;
A “Related Party” means any living spouse, domestic partner, parent, sibling, child or other family member or individual with whom there is an intimate personal and/or economic relationship - for trustees, directors, officers, key employees and persons exercising the power of such positions, the following living relatives:

His or her parents, step-parents, grandparents and step grandparents;
His or her siblings and half-siblings;
The spouses of his or her siblings and half-siblings;
His or her spouse or domestic partner;
His or her children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren;
The spouse of each of his or her children, grandchildren and great grandchildren;
Other family member or individual with whom there is an intimate personal or economic relationship;

Employees of Carrot, and any of their subsidiaries and affiliates, and immediate family members (spouse, parent, child, sibling and their respective spouses, regardless of where they live) or persons living in the same households of such employees; or
Any persons meeting the criteria listed in Section 3.3 of the Terms and Conditions.

‍3. Returning Applicants

Former Bellagio residents applying for a second residency must demonstrate significant professional achievement and/or project advancement since their first residency.

Returning Applicants are not recommended to re-submit unsuccessful proposals but instead to submit a significantly revised proposal on similar themes in future Application rounds.

4. Collaborative Projects

The Bellagio Center Residency Program is predominately designed for individuals but accepts Applications from teams of two people working on a collaborative project. Teams that bring people together from different geographies, institutions, or disciplines are especially welcome to apply.

When applying as a team, please note:

Each team member is required to submit a unique Application and will be evaluated separately;
Each team member must submit their own Application - we are not able to accept Applications submitted on behalf of another person;
Each team member must indicate the same Project Type, Project Theme, and Project Category in their Application;
Team members can use the same answers in the Overview and Project sections of their Application;
The role of each team member should be clarified in each Application;
Team members should have comparable experience and backgrounds - each team member’s credentials will factor into the evaluation;
Applicants who are based in the same organization are not eligible to apply as a team;
Applicants may list the same professional references only if those references are familiar with each Applicant and they submit a unique reference for each Applicant.

5. Guidance Related to Proposed Projects – Charitability

As a U.S. based private foundation, proposed projects that the Residency Program Sponsor supports through each residency must be in furtherance of its exempt charitable purpose. Projects must satisfy the requirements for charitability set by the U.S. Internal Revenue Service, which include such things as provision of relief to the poor, advancement of education or science, preservation of the natural environment, or promotion of social welfare. Projects may promote social welfare through a variety of means, including by eliminating prejudice and discrimination, defending human and civil rights, or combating community deterioration.

Projects cannot have a primary purpose of generating profit or providing a for-profit company with a service or benefit. Every project must result in a public benefit that outweighs any private benefit, so the charitable impact of the work must result in a benefit to a disadvantaged group or other charitable outcome that outweighs an incidental commercial benefit. When presenting your project, please make sure that you are clearly articulating the direct and significant charitable benefit of the work you will be doing, including who will benefit from the project, and how that benefit will be accomplished through your work.

Projects that require special equipment onsite, excursions off the grounds, or access to research libraries are not well suited to the Bellagio Center and are not eligible.

6. Guidance Related to Applications

Video

Each application must include a brief video of no more than 90 seconds that introduces You, Your project, and why now is the ideal time for a Bellagio residency. Your video should not be professionally produced – an informal video created on a smartphone is expected.

Your video must adhere to the following guidelines, or else it will render Your Application ineligible:

No more than 90 seconds in length;
Must be in English or, if in another language, subtitled in English;
Should not include images of identifiable children;
Should not include copyrighted material (including, but not limited to, music) for which You do not have a license;
Your video’s privacy settings should be set to “Unlisted” (not private).

After You record Your video, please upload it to YouTube and enter the URL in the space provided in the Application. If You need technical support, You can contact us by email.

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Curriculum Vitae (CV)

Each Application must include a CV or resume of no more than five pages that includes the following information as applicable:

Degree(s) (degree-granting institution(s), field(s) and date(s) of degree(s) awarded);
Current position (location, dates of employment, professional title, and responsibilities);
Previous positions (in chronological order, including locations, dates of employment, professional titles, and responsibilities);
An abbreviated list of publications that demonstrates the Applicant’s expertise in the area of published work especially in the past five years (articles, books, chapters, reports, exhibitions) including full citations with the name of the publication, title of work, date of publication;
Relevant work: For academics this may include supervision of master’s and PhD theses, conference presentations, grants, honors, or awards, and professional affiliations. For practitioners this may include service on boards, grants, honors, or awards, and professional affiliations. For artists this may include exhibitions, presentations, public performances, grants, honors, etc.;
Other relevant contributions that demonstrate professional achievement.

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References

If invited for an interview, each Applicant must provide two professional references.

Individuals providing a reference should:

Know the Applicant and the Applicant’s work well - individuals in the Applicant’s field who are not familiar with the Applicant’s previous work and/or experience are not recommended;
Be informed of and comment on the merit and substance of the Applicant’s proposed project.

Editors, agents, or others that have a financial interest in an Applicant’s success in being invited for a residency, and who might benefit financially from an Applicant’s residency, are not eligible.

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Work Samples

Each Application must include two work samples uploaded as a single PDF. Depending on the Applicant’s background and the nature of their proposed project, work samples may include:

Writing samples, such as a portion of a book chapter, article, or report;
A selection from a play (video representations of a produced work may be included as a link in the PDF and should not exceed five minutes or specified time code for the five-minute selection to be reviewed);
Summaries of past projects;
Poems;
Images with corresponding image list;
Musical scores with accompanying audio files;
Data visualizations;
Video samples.

Work samples must:

Be reflective of the Applicant’s capacity to execute the project they are proposing in their Application;
Include a 2-3 sentence description with all relevant details including title, year, duration (if applicable), web link (if applicable), any other contextual information, and why it was selected;
Be no more than five years old;
For video or audio links, be no more than five minutes in length, or include a specified time code for the five-minute selection to be reviewed;
Saved as a single PDF that is no more than five pages long and does not exceed 10MB.

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For non-English programs and translation projects:

If none of Your previous work is published in English, include either a translation (indicating who provided the translation) or summary of the work in English.
If You propose to translate an author whose work You have translated previously, please submit samples of the prior translation. If this is Your first translation work, please describe Your qualifications to do so via the Application questions.

7. Treatment and Use of Intellectual Property

Each Application should reflect the anticipated ownership, use, and licensing of any Intellectual Property Rights; the use and licensing of Intellectual Property Rights of the Applicants who are selected for the Residency Program will be subject to the terms of the Resident’s Agreement (or another agreement with the Residency Program Sponsor, as applicable). You represent and warrant that all of Your Application Content constitute original work created solely by You, that You own all Intellectual Property Rights in and to all of the Application Content, and that no other party has any right, title, claim or interest in any of the Application Content, except as expressly identified by You to us in writing in Your Application. If You are Accepted for the Residency Program, You retain all right, title and interest in any inventions, software, works of authorship or other Intellectual Property Rights You develop, invent, create, or acquire during Your participation in the Residency Program remains with You, subject as may be set forth in the Resident’s Agreement between You and the Residency Program Sponsor (see Section 8 below).

8. Resident’s Agreement

All Applicants who are Accepted into the Residency Program shall enter into a Resident’s Agreement directly with the Residency Program Sponsor, containing key terms and conditions which are, for the avoidance of doubt, separate from these Application Rules and TERMS as posted on this website for the Residency Program.

9. Other Application Rules

a. Your Application must be in English.

b. You must complete registration to participate in the Application process for the Residency Program. You cannot reside in nor be governed by countries that are prohibited by law, regulation (including United States or other applicable export laws and regulations), treaty or administrative act from entering into trade relations (including export of technology) with the United States of America or its citizens.

c. Your Application should meet the Application requirements stipulated on this website. You are required to register in advance of any deadlines for the submission of an Application, and You must comply with all other deadlines posted on this website. Your Application may not, in the sole and unfettered discretion of The Rockefeller Foundation and/or Carrot, contain obscene, provocative, defamatory, or otherwise objectionable or inappropriate content. The Rockefeller Foundation reserves the right to cancel, modify, or suspend the Application process and/or the Residency Program itself in whole or in part without liability to You. The Rockefeller Foundation and/or Carrot also reserves the right to disqualify You from participating.

d. By submitting an Application, You represent, warrant, and agree that:

You are the sole author, creator, and owner of the Application and all of the Application Content;
None of the Application Content is the subject of any actual or threatened litigation or claim;
None of the Application Content infringes, misappropriates, or otherwise violates any Intellectual Property Rights, privacy rights, publicity rights, or other proprietary or legal rights of any third party;
The Application Content does not and will not consist of or contain any harmful computer code (sometimes referred to as "malware,“ "viruses," or "worms"); and
The Application, the Application Content, and Your participation in the Application process, does not and will not violate any applicable laws or regulations, including, without limitation, applicable export control laws and regulations of the United States and other jurisdictions. If the Application Content includes any third party works (such as third-party content or open-source code), You must provide the Residency Program Sponsor with all appropriate licenses and releases for such third party works. In the event You cannot provide all such required licenses and releases, the Residency Program Sponsor reserves the right, in the Residency Program Sponsor's sole discretion, to disqualify and/or reject the applicable Application Content or Your Application as a whole.

e. You may participate by registering, but You may not register more than one true and uniform identity; multiple registrations for an Applicant using multiple identities are not allowed. The Rockefeller Foundation and/or Carrot reserve the right to disqualify and/or reject any Application violating this limitation, regardless of whether all of the respective parties had knowledge of such violation. You may only submit one Application.

f. While Carrot is providing an online platform for Your participation in the Application process, Carrot is not responsible for any final decisions regarding Acceptance. Such decisions regarding Acceptance are the sole responsibility of The Rockefeller Foundation and its designees, and under the TERMS each Applicant has agreed to look solely to The Rockefeller Foundation, as the Residency Program Sponsor, for any such Acceptance decisions.

g. By submitting Your Application, You agree to release, discharge, and hold harmless The Rockefeller Foundation and Carrot and their partners, affiliates, subsidiaries, advertising agencies, agents and their employees, officers, directors and representatives from any Loss arising out of Your participation in Application process for the Residency Program and any and all decisions regarding Acceptance. Neither The Rockefeller Foundation nor Carrot assume responsibility for any error, omission, interruption, deletion, defect, or delay in operation or transmission; communications line failure; theft or destruction of or unauthorized access to Applications or Application Content; or alteration of Applications or Application Content. Neither The Rockefeller Foundation nor Carrot are responsible for any problems with or technical malfunction of any telephone network or lines, computer online systems, servers or providers, computer equipment, software, failure of any entry to be received on account of technical problems or traffic congestion on the Internet or any website, human errors of any kind, or any combination thereof, including any injury or damage to Applicants’ or any other persons’ computers related to or resulting from participation, uploading or downloading of any materials related to the Application process and/or the Residency Program. In the event of a dispute about the identity of any Applicant, an online registration will be declared as if made by the authorized account holder of the e-mail address submitted at time of the Application.

h. Applicants agree that these Application Rules and the Application process shall be subject to and governed by the laws of the State of New York and the forum of any dispute shall be in the courts of New York, New York.

i. If for any reason Application process for the Residency Program is not capable of running as planned, due to infection by computer virus, bugs, worms, Trojan horses, denial of service, tampering, unauthorized intervention, fraud, technical failures or any other causes beyond the control of Carrot that corrupt or affect the administration, security, fairness, integrity, or proper conduct of the Application process, Carrot reserves the right, at its sole discretion, to disqualify any individual(s) who tamper with the process, and/or to cancel, terminate, modify, or suspend the Application process.

j. The Residency Program Sponsor reserves the right in its sole discretion to disqualify and/or reject any Applicant who is found to be tampering with the Application process or the operation of the Application process, to be acting in violation of these Application Rules, or to be acting in an unprofessional or disruptive manner, or with the intent to disrupt or undermine the legitimate operation of the Application process, or to annoy, abuse, threaten, or harass any other person.

k. Submitting an Application for the Bellagio Center Residency Program does not constitute an application for any other Rockefeller Foundation program, Carrot-hosted program, or any other program or activity that may be offered by Carrot or the Residency Program Sponsor and/or its affiliates.

l. By submitting an Application, the Applicant represents and warrants that the Application Materials does not contain or reference:

Threatening, slanderous, disparaging, or obscene language;
Discriminatory language (including hate speech) based on race, national origin, age, gender, gender expression, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, size, appearance, or disability;
Sexually explicit content or personal attacks;
Any content that would violate any law, statute, ordinance, rule, or regulation, or any agreement with another person or entity;
Content that directly or indirectly promotes commercial services or products;
Software viruses, Trojan horses, worms, time bombs, bots, or any other computer code or files that are designed to disrupt damage, impact, or limit the functioning of any software or hardware;
False or misrepresented data;
Content violating any privacy or publicity right of any person or entity;
Content that constitutes political campaigning, lobbying, or electioneering;
Content that is the intellectual property of another person or entity, in whole or in part, unless authorized by such person or entity, or that may violate the intellectual property rights of third parties, in whole or in part, whether copyright, trademark, trade secret, or patent; or
Content that requires or is subject to any duty of confidentiality, attribution, or any compensation obligation.

m. The Rockefeller Foundation and/or Carrot reserves the right to disqualify and/or reject any Applicant who violates these Application Rules, the TERMS and/or any standards of behavior expressed or implied in them.

n. Each Applicant acknowledges that third parties may submit information and entries to the Residency Program Sponsor that may contain information, ideas, concepts, and approaches similar to, or the same as, those you submitted to the Application, and that the Residence Program Sponsor may already be working on information, ideas, concepts, and approaches similar to, or the same as, those you submitted. By entering, each Applicant acknowledges and agrees that the Residency Program Sponsor’s actions with respect to another entry or work of its own, even if similar to, or the same as, your entry, will not create any liability of any kind to the Residency Program Sponsor or others involved in the Residence Program. Each Applicant also acknowledges and agrees that participation in the Residence Program and/or selection for the Residency Program does not create any obligation on the part of the Residency Program Sponsor to promote, use in any way, or to take any further action regarding Application materials or an Applicants’ involvement in the Residency Program.

o. The Residency Program cannot support activities that constitute lobbying as defined in Internal Revenue Code Section 4945(d)(1) and the regulations thereunder. Such prohibited activities include any attempt to influence any legislation – U.S. or non-U.S. – through communication with any member or employee of a legislative body or any other governmental official or employee who may participate in the formulation of legislation in which reference is made to specific legislation and a view on such legislation is expressed. Legislation refers to legislation that has already been introduced in a legislative body or to a specific legislative proposal that an organization supports or opposes. The regulations also prohibit support of “grass roots lobbying communications,” which are defined as communications that: (1) refer to specific legislation, (2) reflect a view on such legislation, and (3) encourage the recipient of the communication to take action with respect to such legislation. Further, the dissemination of the results of any activity that is designed to be nonpartisan analysis, research, or study may not be limited to or be directed toward persons who are interested solely in one side of a particular issue.

p. If for any reason, the Residency Program is not capable of running as planned for reasons outside the control of the Residency Program Sponsor, which, in the sole discretion of Funder, may corrupt or impact the administration, security, fairness, integrity, or proper conduct of the Residency Program (or any portion thereof), the Residency Program Sponsor reserves the right to cancel, terminate, modify, or suspend the Residency Program (or a portion thereof) and, in that event, the Residency Program Sponsor shall have no further obligation to any Applicant.

Contact Information

You may contact us with any questions or comments about these Application Rules. Please enter “Application for the Bellagio Center Residency Program” in the subject line of Your email.

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Application Rules & Guidelines