Grants

Sign up for the Newsletter for Request for Proposal announcements.
A partial list of prior grantees is here.

The application window for the Spring 2024 Grant Cycle is closed.

Future Grant Cycles have not been scheduled.
Check back here or subscribe to the newsletter for announcements about future opportunities.

Grants Program Objective

We believe repair is a gateway for learning far more than how to solder and sew. While we celebrate students’ learning technical skills, our objective is more fundamental.

Our grants program provides funding and other resources to K-12 educators and advocates who are teaching not only hands-on technologies, but are also teaching the thinking skills, conceptual frameworks and mindset, and are cultivating the individual agency, that undergird a culture of repair.

Please review the following pages carefully to learn about our priorities and the types of projects we support:

Mission
Repair in Schools and Educational Non-Profits
Newsletters
Prior Grantees

We are especially interested in supporting projects that:

• Will have a beneficial environmental impact, and

• Develop publishable resources others can use to bring repair into K-12 educational settings.

Applicants’ projects should rest on a foundation of repairing physical objects, address learning beyond technical skills, and be designed to have multiplier effects.

Grants will not be made to support ongoing operations or projects in which the grant would support a small portion of total funding. Grants are not intended to be ongoing, but to support developing, refining, and proving effective approaches to teaching repair, and making the accompanying classroom materials, guides, curricula and/or pedagogy widely available.

Request for Proposals

Key Points:

1. The central question informing applicant evaluation is:
   “How will this project advance a culture of repair?”

2. The project must rest on a foundation of repairing physical objects.

Grantee:
Grants can only be made to organizations that are registered with the United States Internal Revenue Service as a 501(c)(3), or that are fiscally sponsored by a 501(c)(3).

Grant Amounts:

The Culture of Repair Project will grant up to $30,000 in the Spring 2024 grant cycle.

1. Standard Grants: $1,000 to $5,000. Examples of grants on the lower end of this range might be for work focused on speaking, publishing, or some other mode of disseminating existing resources and ideas. Grants on the upper end might be used to develop new initiatives and/or to publish more comprehensive materials.

2. Exceptional Grants: Proposals up to $10,000 will be considered for stellar projects that address all focus areas, are integrated into a school’s existing programming or curriculum, and publish materials.

The final total amount granted will be a function of the applications received — the proposals’ requests, the number received, and their quality.

Timing and Process:

• Proposals will be accepted from January 15, 2024 to February 15, 2024.

• Notifications are planned for April 5, 2024.

• A site visit or Zoom interview may be requested as part of the review process.

• Winning proposals will be funded in June 2024.

Sharing:

The Culture of Repair Project places a high premium on amplifying the impact of grantees’ work.

Awardees will be featured in Culture of Repair Project newsletters.

On project completion, awardees are expected to be willing to share meaningful aspects of their work. Sharing would take the form appropriate for the content and could range from publishing new resources on the applicant’s website, to readiness to zoom with someone interested in doing a similar project.

Grantees may request an additional $500 to support sharing their work with other educators and advocates at conferences, panels, or professional development events.

Grantees may be invited to participate in an online discussion among current and past CRP grantees. The purpose of the gathering would be to network and share ideas, information and resources.

Submission:
Via email:  cultureofrepair@gmail.com
Only submit PDF’s. Please do not submit other file formats.

Include: 

1. Proposal (maximum 5,000 characters including spaces; excluding budget, 501(c)(3) documentation and any supplementary materials)

2. Budget

3. Documentation supporting 501(c)(3) status or fiscal sponsorship, including nine-digit EIN (Employer Identification Number). A) For nonprofits, for example, an IRS 501(c)(3) affirmation letter or other proof that the Internal Revenue Service currently recognizes your organization as one to which contributions are tax deductible under section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code. B) For fiscally sponsored organizations, a letter from your fiscal sponsor confirming current sponsorship, accompanied by documentation supporting your fiscal sponsor’s 501(c)(3) status

4. Contact information: Applicant name, email, phone number; organization’s website; and, if fiscally sponsored, fiscal sponsor’s contact information and website

5. Supplementary materials are optional (e.g., letters of recommendation, media coverage, etc.)

6. How you heard about the grant opportunity

PROPOSAL GUIDELINES 

All Proposals Should:

1. Not exceed 5,000 characters (including spaces; excluding budget, 501(c)(3) documentation and any supplementary materials).  

2. Begin with a summary description of the project, not more than 300 characters (including spaces).

3. Discuss logistics, timing and cost.

4. Address these core elements: 
   * Alignment with The Culture of Repair Project vision and mission.
   * Environmental sustainability.
   * Grounding in repairing physical objects.
   * Learning beyond technical skills.
   * Developing resources to support others working to bring repair into educational settings.

Reporting

Reporting is intended to be meaningful and non-burdensome.

Required: Interview after Grantee completes the funded project.
Grantee may be invited to submit written material supporting the interview.

Join the mailing list here