Transform Consulting Group has identified another two new grant opportunities for nonprofits. The William T. Grant Foundation is accepting applications from nonprofit organizations for research projects related to understanding how youth settings work, how they affect youth development, and how they can be improved. The Foundation supports high-quality research that enhances our understanding of how youth settings work, how they affect youth development, and how they can be improved. Grants between $100,000 to $600,000 will be awarded for projects that address theory, policy, and/or practice affecting the settings of youth ages 8 to 25 in the United States.
Social settings are defined as the social environments in which youth experience daily life. These include environments with clear boundaries such as classrooms, schools, and youth-serving organizations, and those with less prescribed boundaries such as neighborhoods or other settings in which youth interact with peers, family members, and other adults. These settings should embed youth within a network of engaging activities; ample resources; meaningful relationships with adults and peers; and opportunities for academic, social, emotional, and identity.
The Foundation is also accepting grant applications for supporting research that can inform policy and practice that affect youth and help close the divide between the research, policy, and practice communities. Grants between $100,000 to $600,000 will be awarded for studies that explore the acquisition, interpretation, and use of research evidence in policy and practice.
Projects should contribute to a body of empirical evidence that is useful for improving policies and practices that affect youth. Some projects directly study policy or practice and how they affect youth settings. Others study youth settings in ways that can inform practitioners or policymakers working to improve them. Examples of research questions that fit the Foundation’s interests include:
• How do instructional practices in classrooms affect racial achievement gaps?
• How do welfare policies affect family processes and, in turn, youth’s well-being?
• Do activities in a youth organization have different influences on engagement for youth of varying ethnicities?
• Can a professional development intervention improve staff relationships with youth in after-school programs?
• What factors influence the reliability and validity of observational measures of family functioning?
• How do service agency directors’ social networks influence their access to and use of research evidence?
• What are the mechanisms by which some organizations are more effective than others in brokering research evidence for policymakers and practitioners?
Further information on these grant opportunities is available here. The deadline for submission of letters of inquiry is August 1, 2013.
Let’s get to work and expand your impact in the community! Transform Consulting Group is available to support your efforts at all levels to strategize, develop, edit and submit successful grant proposals. Contact Transform Consulting Group today for a consultation!
