Andrew W. Mellon Foundation: Scholarly Communications Program

The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation invites community-based archives in the United States and its territories to submit proposals to fund one or more of the following areas of need:

• Operational support for the organization, including general support for staff, space, and utilities
• Collections care, including storage, cataloging, description, and preservation
• Programming and outreach activities, including collecting new materials, and exhibitions, publications, or other uses of the collections

The Foundation’s Scholarly Communications program has been making a series of grants to help diversify the body of primary source evidence available to, for example, activists, artists, researchers in humanities fields, community historians, genealogists, teachers, and students. These grants were designed to support and strengthen a body of archival practice, called community-based archiving.

Amount: The Foundation plans to offer a total of $1,000,000 in two annual calls for proposals, one in 2019 and the second in 2020. In the 2019 round, up to $500,000 will be awarded. Awards will range from $25,000-$100,000 for grants of up to two years in length.

Eligibility: Organizations must:

• Be located within the United States or its territories
• Have 501(c)(3) public charity status, or have an organization with 501(c)(3) public charity status serving as a fiscal sponsor
• Be able to demonstrate autonomy as well as participation from the community being served and represented
• Have an archive with an annual operating expense budget of over $50,000 and no more than $1,000,000
• Be able to provide a recent Form 990 and documentation about the organization’s annual operating budget for the previous two years

Organizations can request grant funding for up to 50% of their annual budget per annum, for up to two years, with a total proposed budget of no less than $25,000 and no more than $100,000. The amount of the request should not compromise the organization’s ability to satisfy the public support test (https://grantspace.org/resources/knowledge-base/public-support-test/)/).

Preference will be given to community-based archives that represent and serve communities marginalized due to oppression based on race, ethnicity, national origin, gender, class, sexuality, religion, ability, and/or geographic location.

Link: https://mellon.org/programs/scholarly-communications/call-for-proposals-community-based-archives/

This post was filed under: