Matrix is pleased to partner with the UC Berkeley Office of Foundation Relations and Corporate Philanthropy in sharing resources to assist researchers in their corporate and foundation giving. Visit the FRCP’s website for an up-to-date list of current funding opportunities. You can also join FRCP’s mailing list to receive monthly communications with new funding opportunities.
William T Grant Foundation Institutional Challenge Grant
Deadline: 9/9/2026
The 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. We welcome applications from partnerships in youth-serving areas such as education, justice, child welfare, foster care, mental health, immigration, and workforce development. We especially encourage proposals from teams with African American, Latinx, Native American, and Asian American members in leadership roles. The partnership leadership team includes the principal investigator from the research institution and the lead from the public agency or nonprofit organization. Funding amount: $650k over three years, with the opportunity to apply for a two-year continuation grant of $350k, for a total of $1M in funding over five years.
Crankstart Foundation: Lever for Change: Boundless San Francisco
Deadline: 9/11/2026 (registration)
Supports ambitious, transformative proposals from organizations anywhere in the world with high-impact ideas to make San Francisco a better place to live. Open to projects in any subject area—including housing, economic mobility, public health, climate resilience, education, and arts & culture—provided the work primarily benefits San Francisco residents. Select finalists will receive development grants from a $1M–$3.5M pool and technical assistance, with up to three final awardees receiving between $10M and $50M each to execute their vision. Funding amount: $1M – $50M.
Arnold Ventures: Strengthening Evidence: Support for RCTs to Evaluate Social Programs & Policies
Deadline: 9/11/2026
This program aims to strengthen the body of proven, effective policies, programs, and interventions by funding researchers to conduct rigorous RCTs across the spectrum of social policy. We believe that understanding which programs and policies work — and which do not — enables policymakers to direct limited resources toward the most effective strategies that improve outcomes at scale. RCTs are one of the strongest tools for generating credible causal evidence. By comparing outcomes between a treatment group and a control group, RCTs transparently and credibly isolate the impact of a program, policy, or intervention. This clarity provides actionable insight for decision-makers and stakeholders and builds confidence to support impactful solutions. Funding amount: unrestricted.
American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS)
Deadline: 9/17/2026
Invites research proposals from scholars in all disciplines of the humanities and interpretive social sciences. In the 2026-27 competition cycle, ACLS will award at least 60 fellowships to scholars across all stages of the scholarly career. Approximately half of the awards will support early-career scholars. ACLS solicits applications from scholars pursuing research on topics grounded in any time period, world region, or humanistic methodology. The ultimate goal of the project should be a major piece of scholarly work by the applicant, which can take the form of a monograph, one or more articles, a publicly engaged humanities project, a digital research project, a critical edition, or other scholarly resources. ACLS Fellowships support projects at any stage of development—early, middle, or late. Funding amount: $60k (6 – 12 months).
Charles Koch Foundation: Future Of Work
Deadline: N/A
Empowering people to engage in work that leads to lives of meaning and contribution. Their support focuses on identifying, exploring, and removing the barriers that keep individuals from realizing their unique potential. Funding: unrestricted.
Charles Koch Foundation: Liberalism
Deadline: N/A
The program supports faculty who ask questions, exchange knowledge, advance new theories, and teach ideas and classical liberal principles that help create conditions necessary for all people to find purpose and unlock their potential. Investments help society’s leaders learn and apply these principles to create value for themselves and others, as well as generate ideas and talent needed to solve the United States’ biggest problems while remaining committed to classical liberal convictions of human dignity, openness, and liberty. Funding: unrestricted.
Open Technology Fund Internet Freedom Fund
Deadline: N/A
OTF supports technology projects that counter online censorship and combat repressive surveillance to enable all citizens to exercise their fundamental human rights online. This fund supports innovative internet freedom projects, including technology development, research, digital security projects, and convenings. Average grants between $50K – $200K.
Open Technology Fund: Rapid Response Fund
Deadline: N/A
This fund provides emergency support to journalists, human rights defenders, and civil society organizations facing digital threats and attacks. Funding: average grant amount between $50k – $200k
Rosenberg Foundation
The foundation makes grants in four priority areas – Leading Edge Fund, Justice and Public Safety, Immigrant Rights and Immigrant Workers’ Rights, and Civil Rights and Civic Participation. The foundation works closely with social justice advocates, policy makers and other thought leaders throughout the state to identify the strategies that will best help us achieve positive impact in California within each program. As such, most of our grantee partners are identified and contacted by foundation staff first. In addition, we frequently invest in emerging initiatives and organizations, and are committed to long-term relationships with our grant partners. Funding: No amount limitations.
Teagle Foundation: Knowledge for Freedom
Deadline: N/A
The initiative supports programs that invite underserved high school students to college to study humanity’s deepest questions about leading lives of purpose and civic responsibility. The Knowledge for Freedom initiative is designed to be adaptable enough to reflect the assets and needs of each institution and coherent enough to create a community of shared practice among programs across the nation. Funding: $100k – $300k (over 3 years).
Teagle Foundation and the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations: Transfer Pathways to the Liberal Arts
Deadline: N/A
The program will support statewide, regional, or consortial academic partnerships between public two-year and private four-year colleges to facilitate transfer and completion of the baccalaureate in the liberal arts. Funding amount: Up to $350k (over 2 – 3 years).