Arnold Ventures
/OVERVIEW: Arnold Ventures, the philanthropic LLC (limited liability corporation) of John and Laura Arnold, takes a venture philanthropy approach to giving in a number of fields, including criminal justice reform, health and public health, education, infrastructure, and public policy research and advocacy.
IP TAKE: Arnold Ventures is one of the largest philanthropies in the U.S., making hundreds of millions in grants annually. Its signature approach is to correct “systemic failures through evidence-based solutions,” and it often funds research in support of public policy goals. Arnold is dedicated to maximizing impact, and isn’t shy about engaging with political giving, funding 501(c)(4) organizations, joining funding collaboratives, and participating in public-private partnerships. This funder exercises a proactive approach to grantmaking and generally does not accept unsolicited proposals, though Arnold does “periodically issue calls for projects.” RFPs, when open, tend to be meticulously detailed. Stay informed of RFPs by subscribing to Arnold’s newsletter. For those interested in researching past grantees, Arnold’s grants database is well-organized. All told, smaller organizations will have difficulty engaging this funder, and only organizations that closely align with Arnold’s mission and desire for “evidence-based” projects will be considered for funding.
PROFILE: Established in 2010, Arnold Ventures originally took the form of the Laura and John Arnold Foundation after the couple signed the Giving Pledge. In 2019, the Arnolds created Arnold Ventures, a limited liability corporation (LLC) that oversees the grantmaking operations for the Laura and John Arnold Foundation, the Action Now Initiative, and the Arnolds’ donor-advised fund. The LLC works to “invest in evidence-based solutions that maximize opportunity and minimize injustice.”
Arnold Ventures has evolved and expanded significantly in a short period of time, as its prolific grantmaking embraces new areas of interest. The LLC currently divides its grantmaking into nearly a dozen funding buckets, including health, criminal justice reform, democracy, climate, higher education, journalism, and affordable housing. The LLC’s grants database reveals several intersecting issue areas.
Grants for Criminal Justice Reform
Arnold Ventures’ Criminal Justice program addresses the justice system that “puts people of color at risk, disproportionately harms low-income people, limits the potential of juveniles caught in the system, and doesn’t give everyone the opportunities they need to get back on track.” The foundation targets problems at every stage of the justice process across several initiatives stated below:
Policing grants support projects that “advance police effectiveness and increase positive encounters between police and the community.” The foundation works with partners to “help implement promising reforms, then rigorously study their impact on crime rates, local budgets, officer safety, and public confidence, particularly within communities most affected.”
Grants for Pretrial Justice help to “implement comprehensive reforms to pretrial justice practices” such as “risk assessment to provide judges with objective data,” “ensuring protections for due process of law” and “advocating for evidence-based practices in prosecutors’ and public defenders’ offices.”
Grants for Public Defense invest in initiatives that aim to improve “access, quality and independence of counsel.”
Community Supervision grants support research into reasons for probation and parole violations and how we can reduce them,” as well as “advocacy that uncovers and remedies economic and racial disparities.”
Grants for Prisons aim to “develop cultures of respect and dignity, safely reduce the prison population, and better prepare people for success in their communities,” and improve “healthcare, education, and employment prospects” for the formerly incarcerated.
Reintegration grants support “strategies to reorient the justice system in ways that minimize barriers to successful reintegration” such as “housing, voting, and job restrictions, and excessive fines and fees.”
Past grantees include the ACLU, Coalition for Public Safety, and the Innocence Project, among many others.
Grants for Public Health, Women and Girls
Arnold Ventures’ Health grants support efforts to “improve healthcare delivery, lower costs, and reduce disparities in access.” Though Arnold Ventures does not have a program dedicated to women and girls, some of its health giving overlaps with women’s reproductive health, which advances women’s empowerment and economic development. Arnold Ventures features several health initiatives that intersect with its research and advocacy interests:
Grants for the Opioid Epidemic aim to treat the crisis as a “public health issue, not a criminal justice problem” in order to “save lives and reduce the economic, social and criminal justice costs of the opioid epidemic.”
Grants for Contraceptive Choice and Access promote “equity, autonomy and justice in the reproductive health care system” by “expanding access to contraception,” “closing gaps in reproductive health care coverage” and “informing women about their contraception options.” They fund services such as “technical assistance to state governments,” “same-day access to birth control” and “research about how to improve access.”
Grants for Drug Pricing aim to ensure that “a drug’s price should be linked to its clinical value to patients” and that “incentives in the supply chain … encourage use of the most effective and least costly drugs.” The foundation also supports the “exploration of alternative ways to fund innovation” and sometimes funds manufacturers of life-saving drugs to prevent shortages.
Grants for Commercial Sector Prices work to “protect patients and payers from surprise bills,” “develop approaches to reduce the prices charged by providers with strong market power” and “investigate and expose anticompetitive practices in the market.”
Grants for Low Value Care work to “reduce wasteful spending, eliminate harm to patients, and increase efficiency in the healthcare system.”
Grants for Medicare Sustainability support “policy changes that would bring the program’s spending and revenue in line while ensuring the program continues to meet beneficiaries’ needs.”
Organ Donation grants work to “help more patients access lifesaving organ transplants” through government accountability.
Grants for Provider Payment Incentives aim to “re-orient the healthcare system toward delivering higher-quality, less-costly care that improves health outcomes and reduces the burden imposed on patients by unnecessary or less-effective treatments.”
Past health grantees include Alliance for Health Policy, Center for Healthcare Transparency, and Drug Policy Alliance, among others.
Grants for Education
Arnold Ventures’ Education issue area aims to “identify and scale the most effective practices for all learners, regardless of race or economic circumstances.” While it does not appear to have a dedicated program for K-12, as it does for its higher education funding, the foundation has made several grants to both.
Grants for K-12 Education
This funder’s K-12 grants, which occur across intersecting initiatives and programs, work to “bring together local school leaders and university researchers to tailor promising innovations in curriculum.” The foundation works to identify successful and innovative education programs across the country and “tailor them to struggling communities so they can reap the same benefits.”
Grants for Higher Education
Higher education grants work to support “policies that promote value and quality in higher education.” Data in higher education, higher education quality and accountability and research into effective student success practices are all stated sub-initiatives of the foundation’s investments into higher education grantmaking.
In light of this focus area, Arnold Ventures is “committed to advancing policies that promote value and quality in higher education,” believing that “by partnering with institutions of higher learning,” the foundation can “identify the stumbling blocks that are holding some students back and find solutions that will put them on a path to success.” Once it has “identified effective practices,” Arnold Ventures aims to work with related systems to “scale those practices to fit their needs.”
Past education grantees include The City Fund, Charter Fund, and StudentsFirst Institute.
Grants for Economic Development and Community Development
Arnold Ventures’ work in democracy and civic engagement primarily revolves around Public Finance. It works to ensure that public funds are “allocated through a fair and equitable process to programs that strengthen communities.”
The foundation’s Tax Policy work advocates that such policies should be based on “evidence, not special interests, and support the needs and priorities of communities.” It funds organizations that “study tax policies, evaluate their effects, and seek to identify sound strategies to improve economic mobility and address inequality.”
Retirement Policy grants support “research on public and private retirement plans to gain insight into how to improve those systems” and “efforts to improve the retirement security of workers,” including “public programs that automatically enroll employees into IRAs and commitments by policymakers to increase funding for pension plans.”
Arnold has also recently launched its Policy Lab to “pair public officials with data analysts and social scientists to learn more about taxpayer needs and demand for state services.” Past grantees include the Bipartisan Policy Center, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, and the Institute for Fiscal Studies.
Important Grant Details:
Arnold Ventures’ grants generally range from $50,000 to $10 million. Arnold’s grantmaking is driven by evidence-based policy, research, and advocacy. It invests heavily in research efforts, conducts randomized controlled trials in social policy, and supports ongoing advocacy to bring its results to the attention of lawmakers. Grantseekers may search its Grants Database for more information on its grantmaking habits.
Arnold Ventures does not accept unsolicited applications except when it releases requests for proposals. Deadlines may vary.
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