Open call: William T. Grant Foundation – Institutional Challenge Grant

Apr 22, 2026 | Awards & Funding, Faculty, Research

To: Science Faculty and Researchers
From: Office of Foundation Relations
Subject: Funding Opportunity

The Office of Foundation Relations is pleased to share this open call for funding from the William T. Grant Foundation.  

 

Overview

The William T. Grant Foundation Institutional Challenge Grant supports university-based research institutes, schools, and centers in building sustained research-practice partnerships with public agencies or nonprofit organizations in order to reduce inequality in youth outcomes.

The grant requires that research institutions shift their policies and practices to value collaborative research. Institutions will also need to build the capacity of researchers to produce relevant work and the capacity of agency and nonprofit partners to use research.

Research institutions will need to address four important goals:

  • Grow an existing institutional partnership with a public agency or nonprofit organization.
  • Pursue a joint research agenda to reduce inequality in youth outcomes.
  • Create institutional change to value research-practice partnerships within research institutions.
  • Enhance the capacity of both partners to collaborate on producing and using research evidence.

 

Award Amount & Terms

WTGF will award at least two Institutional Challenge Grants. Each award will provide $650,000 over three years. This includes:

  • Up to $60,000 for up to 9 months of joint planning activities (e.g., refining protocols for partnering, selecting fellows, finalizing partnership and data sharing agreements, etc.).
  • Funding for two years of a full-time equivalent mid-career fellowship. In addition, universities are required to fund one additional year of a full-time equivalent fellowship for the mid-career fellow.
    • Fellowships may be allocated in different ways, for example, by appointing one individual fellow for three years, or three different fellows each for one year, or six half-time fellows for one year each, etc. The minimum appointment level for a fellow is half-time for half of one year.
  • Up to three years of support for the partnership to conduct and use research to reduce inequality in youth outcomes.
  • Resources to advance the proposed institutional shifts and capacities of both partners.
  • Indirect cost allowance of up to 15 percent of total direct costs.

 

Eligibility

  • Eligible principal investigators
    • Eligible principal investigators are leaders at eligible research institutions. They have visibility, influence on institutional policies and practices, and access to the resources needed to optimize and implement the award. They also possess the skills needed to cultivate trusting relationships with leaders from the partner public agency or nonprofit organization and to ensure the conduct of high-quality research.
  • Eligible partnerships
    • WTG is most interested in supporting existing research-practice partnerships that will use the grant to continue learning and growing.
    • While the competition is open to partnerships at different stages of maturity, the grant is intended to add significant value to what already exists. As a general guideline, the partnership should be far enough along to conduct the proposed work, but not so established that the grant adds little value to what is currently in place.
  • Eligible fellows
    • All fellows must be mid-career.
    • For researchers, we define mid-career as having received the terminal degree within 8 to 20 years of the date that the application is submitted. (This should be calculated by adding 8 and 20 years to the date the doctoral degree was conferred. For medicine, an institution should use the date from the completion of the first residency.) 
    • The research fellow does not need to be an employee of the research institution and can be recruited from another institution.
    • You may appoint one mid-career fellow from the public agency or nonprofit organization. (All other fellows must be researchers). This should be a mid-career professional at the agency or organization who will be called on to facilitate the use of research. A mid-career professional has 8 to 20 years of cumulative experience in his/her current role.

 

Please see full program guidelines and FAQs.

Please see the foundation’s informative webinar.

See here for a list of current institutional challenge awardees.  

 

Timeline

  • September 9, 2026, 12:00 p.m. PT Application Deadline
  • January 30, 2027 Finalist Interviews

 

Special Instructions

Please notify the Office of Foundation Relations if you are interested in applying to this opportunity (fr@ucsc.edu). Please submit a proposal intake form prior to UCSC’s internal Institutional Deadlines. For support developing your proposal, please send a request to the Office of Research Development resdev@ucsc.edu. Within the Division of Social Sciences, please contact Ashlee Tews (ashleeac@ucsc.edu), and within the Arts, please contact Hannah Jasper (hannahjasper@ucsc.edu) to initiate notification and proposal support.

 

Call Sent: April 22, 2026

The Office of Foundation Relations is a unit of University Advancement. The FR team creates and maintains mutually beneficial, long-term relationships with private organizations, matching grant initiatives with educational and research programs and centers. FR supports faculty and staff to identify and approach these and other private foundations for funding, to assist in strategic positioning of the grant application, and to facilitate funder campus visits. For a list of recent funding opportunities, please visit the FR website: FR Calls for Funding.

If you have any questions or comments, please contact caroline@ucsc.edu
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