Mitchell Kapor Foundation

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How to Apply

• Funding Interests
• Criteria
• Eligibility
• Review Process
• Submit a Request
• Application
• Submit a Final Report

Funding Interests

The Mitchell Kapor Foundation has identified “key partner organizations” – those whose work is most closely aligned with our three core program areas: Green Access, Voting Integrity and Civic Engagement, and the College Bound Brotherhood. We anticipate working with past and current grant recipients as well as new organizations as key partners. Key partners are solicited by invitation only.

We will also provide limited support of one-time special opportunities and efforts, namely convenings and tech-related work. Organizations can apply for these grants each quarter. Our 2010 grant application deadlines are February 17,   April 1, September 1, and November 15. Please check our website for any updates before the deadlines, and of course, interested applicants must have a conversation with appropriate staff before proceeding with a grant request.

We will generally consider grant requests up to $30,000 for appropriately stable organizations.

We’re not afraid to take a risk on unconventional or untried approaches to tackling social problems and are definitely interested in community organizations that haven’t had traditional access to support from foundations and donors. If this is the case with your organization, please feel free to contact us to discuss your project or program’s needs.

Criteria

In alignment with the spirit of our vision, the work of our grantee organizations should either shift paradigms by reaching beyond the status quo to present issues and solutions in fresh and innovative ways, or increase the reach of effective work through scaling and expanding programs or projects.  

Given our demographic focus, Foundation-supported grant projects should primarily impact people of color. For our purposes, this means that loosely 60% or more of the program’s target population identify as Black/African American, Asian/Pacific American, Latino/Hispanic American, Native American, or mixed heritage. We’ll also consider work that points out and dismantles white privilege, helping to build equitable relationships across race/ethnicity.

We recognize that social change is not created piecemeal or in isolation; Foundation-supported work should clearly contribute to a greater social movement toward equity and fairness for all.

Eligibility

In order to be eligible for a grant from the Mitchell Kapor Foundation, an organization must have I.R.S. 501(c)(3) status and be classified as “not a private foundation” under Section 509 (a), or have a similarly qualified fiscal sponsor.

Organizations applying for Green Access grants must be located in or have projects that serve residents in one of the counties of the San Francisco Bay Area: Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, Napa, San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Sonoma or Solano. National organizations with a Bay Area chapter meet these criteria. We will also consider organizations doing California statewide public policy work.

Organizations applying for VoICE grants can be located and working anywhere in the United States. Our funding priorities focus on organizations working: a) in several states under a national umbrella, b) throughout the state of California, or c) in collaboaration with San Francisco Bay Area organizations.

The Foundation never funds individuals for personal projects, and rarely funds:

• Organizations that are not qualified charities with I.R.S. 501(c)(3) status or that do not have a similarly qualified fiscal sponsor. Supporting organizations generally do not qualify for our grants.
• Academic research not related to or supportive of other ongoing Foundation interests, or that does not have practical applications which help our target populations.
• Special-event fundraising activities.
• Programs that do not address our interest areas.

Review Process

We accept grant requests on a rolling basis with quarterly deadlines. Applicants must have a conversation with the appropriate foundation staff BEFORE submitting a grant request. We strive to be responsive to requests, so we will try to notify all grant applicants by email within three weeks after the deadline.

For work that we’re interested in potentially supporting, we will contact your organization via email to invite you to submit additional information. We usually follow up with a phone call or site visit before making a recommendation to our Board, which meets quarterly to consider grant recommendations.

Please contact us to discuss time-sensitive needs, as it is possible to get provisional approval.

Submit a Request

We have a paper-free process, so all grant requests must be submitted using our online application. Applicants must have a conversation with the appropriate foundation staff BEFORE submitting a grant request.

The first few questions of online process will ask you about eligibility. You'll also need to create an account with a user name and password. Once you're logged in, you can begin the online application. You may want to type the answers in a Word document first, and then cut and paste them into the appropriate fields. We have an electronic sample application that you can use to craft your application responses prior to online submission. However, we will not accept email submissions of grant requests.

If at any point you have questions about the online application, please contact us or online support at CyberGrants.

Note: If you are grantseeker from a university-related or public entity and have trouble with the 501(c)(3) identification in CyberGrants, please contact online support directly!

Submit a Final Report

Final Reports (called Impact Reports in CyberGrants) are vital to helping us to gauge the achievements and challenges of grant recipients' work, and by extension, ours. This report will be read by both our staff and, at times, external evaluators who may contact you at a later date with confidential follow-up questions.

Once you access your CyberGrants account using the link below, you should find a link to the Impact Report. Please complete and submit it by the due date. If you have any questions about the Report, please contact Tiffany Price. We recommend that you answer questions in an electronic document, and cut and paste those responses into our online form. For a sample fnal report form, please click HERE.

We look forward to learning more about the results of your work; thanks in advance for your constructive and open feedback.

UPDATE:

The next grant application deadline for Green Access or VoICE requests is September 1, 2010. Applicants must have a conversation with the appropriate foundation staff BEFORE submitting a grant request.

The College Bound Brotherhood grant application deadline for 2010 has passed. We will notify all applicants by Wednesday, September 15, 2010. If you missed the annual deadline, we will most likely open up another round in May, 2011.