William T. Grant Foundation
/OVERVIEW: The William T. Grant Foundation supports research and interventions aimed at reducing inequality in the lives of young people. It makes grants in the areas of education, mental health and work and opportunity.
IP TAKE: The William T. Grant Foundation provides significant support for large-scale quantitative studies of education, youth development and mental health. The foundation also supports research-based interventions, collaborations between researchers and public agencies and nonprofit youth service providers in New York City. The foundation limits funding to the U.S, with several grants prioritizing top research universities. This is an accessible funder that also provides all application and deadline information on its site. WGF is an open-minded funder that invests in a range of organizations, so long as they share the foundation’s vision. WGF, however, does not take notable risks in its giving. Make sure to have a budget and research-based information to back your proposal.
PROFILE: William T. Grant was the owner of the successful W.T. Grant and Company department store chain. He established the William T. Grant Foundation in New York City in 1936 to support “research to improve the lives of young people.” Grant’s stores would eventually shutter in what is often referred to as one of the largest retailer bankruptcies in history, but his foundation continues to support Grant’s original grantmaking priorities. The foundation’s two primary focus areas are reducing inequality and improving the use of research evidence. Secondary grantmaking programs include institutional challenge grants, which encourage collaboration between public agencies and research institutes; the William T. Grant Scholars Program, which supports early-career researchers whose research aims to reduce inequality and grants for New York City youth service providers that aim to improve service or increase capacity.
Grants for Mental Health
The William T. Grant Foundation invests in youth mental health through its research and youth services grantmaking programs. Research grants tend to support psychological and sociological studies of underserved, minority or traumatized populations of children and young adults. One grantee, a researcher at the University of California at Riverside, studied the effect of sanctuary city policies on the mental health of Latinx children. Another funded study by an author at Boston University considered the stigma and suicide risks associated with gender and racial minority status in teens.
Grantmaking for New York City organizations that provide youth services are limited to organizations that serve youth between the ages of five and 25 and that operate within the five boroughs of New York City. The program’s overarching goal is to “strengthen existing services by helping youth-serving organizations address challenges or remedy problems at the point of service, where staff and youth interact.” Recent grantees include the Lesbian, Gay Bisexual & Transgender Community Center, which used funding for substance abuse recovery programs, and Esperanza New York, which used funding for trauma therapy for court-involved youth across the city’s five boroughs.
Less often, the Grant Foundation supports mental health initiatives through its institutional challenge grants. In 2018, researchers at Cornell University collaborated with Cornell’s Cooperative Extension in Tompkins County, New York to investigate the relationships between adult opioid use and child maltreatment in rural upstate New York communities.
Grants for K-12 Education
Educational research and interventions account for more than half of the Grant Foundation’s funding and are awarded across all of the foundation’s grantmaking programs. Education grants generally focus on marginalized or underserved K-12 populations and posit education the most effective means of reducing inequality. Specific areas of interest include the role of mentoring in academic achievement, increasing access to quality education, the effect of educational policy on outcomes, curricula, teacher variables and school-level discipline practices. One recent research grant supported a study at the University of California at Irvine that assessed the effect of school choice on educational equity. A study at the Medical University of South Carolina assessed whether training teachers to address unconscious biases improved outcomes for African American students. An institutional challenge grant was awarded to a collaboration between Northwestern University and Evanston Township High School for an intervention providing “more equitable experiences” for low-income and minority students.
Several recent education grants also funded youth service providers in New York City. These grantees include the literacy program Behind the Book, the computer science education program Brooklyn on Tech and the Rockaway Waterfront Alliance, which used funding to run a college readiness program for local high school students.
Grants for Economic Development
Grant’s work and opportunity grantmaking is limited to research and interventions for young adults up to the age of 25 and often overlaps with the foundation’s higher education and technical or vocational training grantmaking. Underserved and minority populations are prioritized by these grants. At Northwestern University, the foundation supported a study of the effects of mentoring and career development programs on students of color and low-income youth. New York City service providers to receive funding include the Red Hook Initiative, which used funding to run employment and educational placement services for high need young adults, and VISIONS, an organization that provides summer employment and internship opportunities for blind and visually impaired youth.
Important Grant Details:
The William T. Grant Foundation awards about $6 million in grants. Grants are generally awarded in amounts up to $500,000, with an average grant size of about $75,000. Grants for New York City youth service organizations are $25,000. Grantees tend to be top-tier research universities and institutes that partner with large public agencies. Youth organization grantees tend to have proven track records of success. For additional information about past grantmaking, see the foundation’s grants database.
This funder accepts applications for all its programs. Guidelines, due dates and requirements for each program are linked to the foundation’s grants page. General inquiries may be directed to the foundation’s staff via email, online form or telephone at 212-752-0071.
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