Mellon Foundation Awards $3.3 Million to American Council of Learned Societies

NEW YORK, PRNewswire -- The American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) has been awarded a $3.3 million grant by the Mellon Foundation to continue its Digital Justice Grant Program. The extension grant will support the program for an additional three competition cycles, beginning with the next competition which will start accepting applications in September 2023.

Launched in 2021, the ACLS Digital Justice Grant Program supports digital projects across the humanities and interpretative social sciences that engage with the interests and histories of people of color and other historically marginalized communities. Specifically, the program addresses persistent inequities in access to tools and support for digital work among these scholars, those working with non-traditional materials, and those based at higher education institutions with fewer resources available to support humanists working with digital techniques. This new iteration of the program will also seek to fund projects that engage in capacity building efforts, including but not limited to: pedagogical projects that train students in digital humanities methods as a key feature of the project’s content building practice; publicly engaged projects that develop new technological infrastructure with community partners; and trans-institutional projects that connect scholars across academic and cultural heritage institutions.

“The ACLS Digital Justice Grant Program provides critical support and resources to scholars in fields that challenge the historical legacies of settler colonialism, racial capitalism, and heteronormativity,” said Keyanah Nurse, ACLS Program Officer for Higher Education Initiatives. “These grants stimulate more inclusivity within digital humanities by extending the opportunity to a broader assemblage of scholars and projects, many of whom navigate weak infrastructural support. With an added emphasis on capacity building, we hope this new iteration gives reviewers a more nuanced understanding of the contexts in which scholars at less resourced institutions pursue their work.”

The ACLS Digital Justice Program will continue to offer both Seed and Development

Foot Locker Foundation Announces $4.5 Million for Community Grants through LISC

NEW YORK, PRNewswire -- Foot Locker, Inc. and its U.S. grant-making partner, the Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC), are building upon their collaboration to empower youth in underserved communities with $4.5 million in new funding. The funding will support three annual grant application rounds for U.S.-based nonprofits delivering youth programming in the areas of community mentoring, career development, and health and wellness activities.

The Foot Locker Foundation Community Empowerment Program was launched in 2021 as part of Leading in Education and Economic Development (LEED), the company’s $200 million commitment focused on education and economic development within the Black community. It also connects to LISC’s broad-based work on economic opportunity, including its decade-long Project 10X strategy to promote racial justice. Through its first two years, the competitive grant program has awarded $2.7 million in grants to 36 organizations.

Grants to promote and provide vital resources for projects that diversify the digital domain, advance justice and equity in digital scholarly practice, and contribute to public understanding of racial and social justice issues. For exploratory, experimental, and other early-stage work, Digital Justice Seed Grants will offer $10,000-$25,000 to support planning workshops, prototyping, and testing of projects. For projects that have advanced beyond the prototyping or proof-of-concept phase, Digital Justice Development Grants of $50,000 to $100,000 will support activities to enhance impact and promote uptake and engagement among targeted communities of users. As in its pilot year, grantees can also opt into tailored coaching from the Nonprofit Finance Fund to plan for the long-term stewardship and growth of their projects.

Formed a century ago, the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) is a nonprofit federation of 79 scholarly organizations. As the leading representative of American scholarship in the humanities and interpretive social sciences, ACLS upholds the core principle that knowledge is a public good. In supporting its member organizations, ACLS utilizes its $155+ million endowment and $37 million annual operating budget to expand the forms, content, and flow of scholarly knowledge, reflecting our commitment to diversity of identity and experience.

ACLS collaborates with institutions, associations, and individuals to strengthen the evolving infrastructure for scholarship. In all aspects of our work, ACLS is committed to principles and practices in support of racial and social justice.

The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation is the nation’s largest supporter of the arts and humanities. Mellon believes that the arts and humanities are where we express our complex humanity, and that everyone deserves the beauty, transcendence, and freedom to be found there. Through its grants, Mellon seeks to build just communities enriched by meaning and empowered by critical thinking, where ideas and imagination can thrive. The Foundation makes grants in four core program areas: Arts and Culture; Higher Learning; Humanities in Place; and Public Knowledge.

Questions? Contact digitaljustice@acls.org.

The application for the next round of funding in the U.S. (for one-year grants expected to be awarded in 2024) is open now through Wednesday, August 30, 2023. Community-based nonprofits in select cities can apply for grants of $25,000 to $100,000. The program prioritizes grassroots organizations that are in a pivotal developmental stage where the funding and available technical assistance support through LISC can help them reach the next level of sustainability and program delivery excellence. Organizations based in and serving the following cities are eligible to apply for these competitive grants: Atlanta, Baltimore, Chicago, Dallas, Detroit, Houston, Los Angeles, New York City, Newark, Oakland, Philadelphia, San Francisco and Washington, D.C.

Applicants should have a track record of impact in one or more of the program’s key objectives: community outreach, particularly focused on youth health and wellness; mentoring around life skills, academics, and conflict resolution; and career development to build skills and pathways to employment.

“As part of our LEED initiative, the partnership with LISC has created tangible results for communities where Foot Locker, Inc. operates,” said Tai Neal, vice president for LEED Strategy at Foot Locker, Inc. “In the first two years of the program, we’ve witnessed the number of young people served increase by nearly 50 percent, with 3,800 impacted in the first round of funding and more than 7,000 in round two,” she continued. “This program disrupts the status quo – unlocking the potential that exists in young people and giving them, their families, and their communities a bridge to a brighter future.”

The Community Empowerment Program responds to clear and persistent racial disparities, including a gap in philanthropic funding for Black-led organizations. For example, research from Bridgespan and Echoing Green found that the unrestricted net assets of Black-led organizations are 76 percent smaller than those of similarly situated white-led groups. Disparities are even more pronounced among organizations that specifically focus on improving life outcomes for Black men and boys: revenues are 45 percent less than they are for white-led organizations and unrestricted net assets are 91 percent smaller—even when white-led organizations have a similar mission.

“These disparities are, in part, the result of decades of overt racism,” said Lisa Glover, LISC CEO. “But there is also an unconscious bias at work, and it has a stranglehold on opportunity for tens of thousands of BIPOC families, organizations, businesses and communities. That’s why this program is so important,” she continued. “It is specifically designed to address these systemic gaps in ways that not only benefit young people, but strengthen the organizations that serve them as well.”

Foot Locker, Inc. is a leading footwear and apparel retailer that unlocks the “inner sneakerhead” in all of us. With approximately 2,700 retail stores in 29 countries across North America, Europe, Asia, Australia, and New Zealand, and a franchised store presence in the Middle East and Asia, Foot Locker, Inc. has a strong history of sneaker authority that sparks discovery and ignites the power of sneaker culture through its portfolio of brands, including Foot Locker, Kids Foot Locker, Champs Sports, WSS, and atmos. For more information, visit footlocker-inc.com.

LISC is one of the country’s largest community development organizations, helping forge vibrant, resilient communities across America. We work with residents and partners to close systemic gaps in health, wealth and opportunity and advance racial equity so that people and places can thrive. Since our founding in 1979, LISC has invested $29.7 billion to create more than 489,000 affordable homes and apartments, develop 81.4 million square feet of retail, community and educational space and help tens of thousands of people find employment and improve their finances. For information on grant guidelines and how to apply, visit tinyurl. com/y5m8mx7n.