Deadline: 24 September 2019
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) is currently accepting proposals for its program entitled “Community Power: Increasing Understanding of Base-Building Methods” to support collaborations between grassroots-led organizations and researchers.
Purpose
This CFP will support research projects to build an understanding of the range of methods applied in innovative and effective community base-building that result in changes to community-level social, economic, and physical conditions that they know influence health and equity. RWJF is seeking to fund research projects designed to retrospectively examine various methods resulting in innovative and effective community base-building. Base-building is a set of strategies and activities used by residents, workers, consumers, and other constituencies to build collective strength and power to address a variety of inequitable conditions in communities. Base-building has been utilized for generations by grassroots-led organizations and institutions to build power specifically in historically excluded or underrepresented populations.
They are seeking research proposals whose project teams will participate alongside other field and research experts in the RWJF Lead Local program, which is exploring the question: How does community power catalyze, create and sustain conditions for healthy communities? RWJF is aware that community base-building methods vary across geographic areas and across racial, ethnic, and other demographic groups. They seek to understand community-identified innovations that lead to meaningful and effective community base-building. The proposed research projects are not intended to build understanding of methodologies applied to other critical approaches to achieve systems change, including policy advocacy, coalition-building, communications, or organizational development.
Total Awards
- RWJF expects to award grants ranging from $200,000 to $250,000 each. A total amount of $1,000,000 is available for this CFP.
- Projects ideally will be 18 months in duration with the potential to extend to 24 months if needed.
- This call for proposals (CFP) seeks to support collaborations between grassroots-led organizations and researchers to build the field’s understanding of the range of methods applied in base-building efforts that result in changes to community-level social, economic, and physical conditions that they know influence health and equity. For the purposes of this CFP, they have identified three categories that characterize common basebuilding methodologies: processes, infrastructure, and relationships. Applicants are expected to include research in each of the methodology categories and may also address additional basebuilding methodologies and activities not included in the table.
- Funded collaborations are encouraged to leverage resources from other sources to support research, engagement, and dissemination activities.
- The proposed budget should be appropriate to the scope of work.
- Grants will begin in December 2019.
Eligibility Criteria
- RWJF encourages proposals from applicants who represent a wide range of organizations and disciplines—both within and outside the public health sector.
- Applicants may include nonprofit organizations and nongovernmental organizations as members of the proposed collaboration between grassroots-led organization(s) and researcher(s).
- Preference will be given to applicants that are either public entities or nonprofit organizations that are tax-exempt under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code and are not private foundations or Type III supporting organizations. RWJF may require additional documentation.
- Awards will be made to organizations, not individuals.
- Applicant organizations must be based in the United States or its territories.
- Building a Culture of Health means integrating health into all aspects of society, so theyencourage applicants that represent, or have authentic relationships and/or collaborations with low-income communities and communities of color hardest hit by health inequities.
- This CFP will support projects that include collaborations between grassroots-led organization(s) and researcher(s). Therefore, applicants must be a grassroots-led organization (nonprofit, resident-led, faith-based, etc.).
Selection Criteria
A team of external and internal reviewers will evaluate all proposals. RWJF seeks to fund projects that together showcase a variety of community base-building methodologies. The review process will consider the applicant’s responses to the proposal elements described above as well as the degree to which the applicant organization(s) meet the following selection criteria:
- Vision for the proposed research and alignment with the CFP purpose and focus.
- Quality and feasibility of the proposed research design.
- Focus, qualifications, and experience of applicant organization(s), researcher(s)s, and key personnel.
- Appropriateness of the proposed budget and management structure for the project.
How to Apply
Interested applicants can apply online via the given website.
For more information, please visit https://www.rwjf.org/en/library/funding-opportunities/2019/community-power-measuring-the-impact-of-community-based-base-building.html
