Education, Human Rights & Inclusion: May 2025 Funding Opportunities
Includes opportunities in human rights, reduced inequality, financial inclusion, and livelihoods.
The grants are organized into three categories:
Open Calls: Current grant and opportunities with a deadline. Grants are listed by closing date.
Rolling Applications: current grant and opportunities with rolling applications (but it’s still best to submit as early as possible).
Long term planning: Grants that have closed their current rounds, but are expected to open new windows.
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Open Calls:
Racial Equity Research Grants, Spencer Foundation. *Closing soon!*
The Racial Equity Research Grants program supports education research projects that will contribute to understanding and ameliorating racial inequality in education. They are interested in funding studies that aim to understand and disrupt the reproduction and deepening of inequality in education, and which seek to (re)imagine and make new forms of equitable education. They are accepting applications from research projects that seek to envision educational opportunities in a multiplicity of education systems, levels, settings, and developmental ranges and that reach beyond documenting conditions and paradigms that contribute to persistent racial inequalities. The goal of this program is to support rigorous, intellectually ambitious, and technically sound research that is relevant to the most pressing questions and compelling opportunities in relation to racial equity in education. In this cycle of funding, they will continue to fund scholarship focused on a range of communities and issues with respect to equity. They encourage proposals from across the methodological spectrum, including qualitative methods, mixed-methods, and quantitative methods. They especially encourage Racial Equity proposals that focus on the following areas: (1) innovative forms of measurement and assessment, (2) artificial intelligence (AI), and (3) current political challenges in k-12 and higher education around diversity, equity, and inclusion.
Geographies: Global.
Who can apply: Principal Investigators (PIs) with an earned doctorate in an academic discipline or professional field and affiliated with a non-profit organization or public/governmental institution that is willing to serve as the administering organization if the grant is awarded.
Funding amount: Grants up to $75,000 for projects ranging from one to five years.
Targeted Sectors/ SDGs: Education, racial equity.
Deadline: Intent to apply deadline May 5, 2025, full proposal deadline June 2025.
Grants for Civil Society Organizations in the MENA Region, Minority Rights Group. *Closing soon!*
Now accepting applications for advocacy grants and core funding grants. These grants are available for Human Rights Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) aim to maximize the attention toward the situation of minorities and marginalized communities in the target countries, and that want to invest in their organizational development, organizational infrastructures or to effectively develop their institutional capacity.
Geographies: Lebanon, Tunisia, Morocco and Palestine.
Who can apply: human rights and minority rights/ minority groups led nonprofit organizations
Funding amount: Grants range EUR €11,000 - €33,000.
Targeted Sectors/ SDGs: Migrants, inclusion, advocacy.
Deadline: May 4, 2025.
Learn more and apply here for advocacy grants and here for core grants.
Mobilize Power Fund, Third Wave Fund. *Closing soon!*
The Mobilize Power Fund is a rapid response fund that resources gender justice organizations to adapt or pivot their work when met with unanticipated, time-sensitive opportunities or threats to their movement building work and organizing conditions. The Fund prioritizes organizations that are responding to specific incidents or changes of circumstances that have occurred in the last six months. This can include rapid response mobilizations, healing justice work, conflict resolution/conflict transformation, community accountability, mutual aid, direct actions, emergency safety, security, and defense needs, and more. This fund prioritizes groups and organizations who are experiencing an unanticipated incident. Because of this, organizations applying on behalf of a budget shortfall or preplanned events or ongoing programming will not be prioritized.
Geographies: United States and U.S. territories, including American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
Who can apply: Organizations that are led by young women of color (transgender and cisgender), and trans, queer, gender non conforming and intersex young people of color under 35, led by and for communities directly impacted by the issues they focus on, have an intersectional gender justice lens, and have a total organizational budget under $500k. Groups do not need 501c3 of fiscal sponsor status to apply.
Funding amount: Grants can be made for up to $10,000 USD. Partnership or coalitions of two or more groups can request up to $20,000 USD.
Targeted Sectors/ SDGs: Participatory Action Research, healing justice work, conflict mediation/resolution, legal or bail fees, marches or rallies, leadership training & skills building, mutual aid, and unanticipated legislative or ballot initiative campaigns.
Deadline: May 6, 2025. Next deadlines are July 1, 2025, August 5, 2025, and October 7, 2025.
Sustainable Protection Fund: Open Call for Applications from SWANA 2025, The Digital Defenders Partnership (DDP). *Closing soon!*
Invites human rights organizations and collectives from the SWANA region (Southwest Asia and North Africa) to apply for the Sustainable Protection Fund. This fund supports long-term digital security capacity building. The fund prioritizes organizations and collectives working on: Media and freedom of expression, Civil and political rights, Feminist and LGBTQ+ movements.
Geographies: Algeria, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Palestine, Syria, Tunisia, and Yemen.
Who can apply: Human rights organizations and collectives
Funding amount: Grants of up to EUR €15,000 for projects lasting 6 to 12 months.
Targeted Sectors/ SDGs: Human rights.
Deadline: May 7, 2025.
Regional Partnership Fund: Open Call for Applications from SWANA 2025, The Digital Defenders Partnership (DDP). *Closing soon!*
Through this fund, DDP provides to support organizations and collectives working to advance internet freedom and protect human rights defenders (HRDs) from a holistic perspective. They welcome a wide range of initiatives that strengthen digital rights and support HRDs at risk. Funded activities may include (but are not limited to): Ensuring internet access during shutdowns, slowdowns, censorship, or infrastructure disruption, Providing digital security training, accompaniment, or broader protection support to HRDs, Offering technical expertise such as digital forensic analysis, secure hosting, or other vital services for civil society, Engaging in advocacy and lobbying efforts to defend digital rights and online freedom, Covering core costs for high-impact organizations or collectives with limited access to other funding.
Geographies: Algeria, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Palestine, Syria, Tunisia, and Yemen.
Who can apply: Human rights organizations and collectives
Funding amount: Grants of up to EUR €25,000 for a period of up to 1 year.
Targeted Sectors/ SDGs: Internet freedom, human rights.
Deadline: May 7, 2025.
Education Opportunity Fund, KLA Foundation. *New!*
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