Guidelines

The Open Society Campaign for Black Male Achievement aims to create hope and opportunities for black men and boys who are significantly marginalized from U.S. economic, social, and political life.

The campaign seeks to treat black males like Lani Guiner's "miner's canary," a critical signal to our society that we cannot exclude and subjugate broad segments of our citizenry without damaging democracy and open society values for all. Through the campaign, the Open Society Foundations seek to confront a formidable challenge to an open society. Read more about the campaign.

Campaign grantmaking seeks to:

• promote education equity, and dismantle of the school-to-prison pipeline, to ensure that black boys have the opportunity to excel academically, to prepare for college, and to learn skills essential to earning a living wage;
• strengthen low-income black families through responsible fatherhood initiatives, policy advocacy, and supporting efforts that lift barriers facing single mothers raising black boys;
• expand and ensure 21st-century family supportive wage work opportunities for black males;
• integrate strategic communications into the campaign's work across its three core areas to promote positive messages about black men and boys;
• promote leadership development and advocacy/organizing training for young black males, providing them with the tools to become empowered citizens and informed advocates for themselves and their communities;
• serve as a catalyst in the field of philanthropy for leveraging additional private and public funds for the field of black men and boys;
• develop strategies that build local coalitions to marshal resources and expertise, to improve life outcomes for black men and boys.

Eligibility

CBMA provides funding for a wide range of policy advocacy strategies including the following:

• Grassroots organizing and mobilization;
• Coalition building;
• Public awareness and strategic communications;
• Impact litigation;
• Policy-driven research and analysis;
• Leadership development;
• Model programs. 

CBMA funds national, state, and local organizations focused on outcomes in the U.S. regions of Baltimore, MD; Philadelphia, PA; Jackson, MS; New Orleans, LA; Chicago, IL; and Milwaukee, WI. 

CBMA will consider letters of inquiry from organizations or projects out of these regions only if the proposed activities have clear and demonstrable potential for national impact and/or replication in other localities or regions.

CBMA will consider letters of inquiry from advocacy groups, community groups, scholarly or research institutions, government agencies, associations of elected officials, and nonprofit business associations or initiatives 

CBMA does NOT provide funding for:

• Direct services that do not also advance one of the advocacy strategies listed in the program description;  
• Lobbying activities;
• Annual fundraising drives;
• Projects undertaken by individuals;
• Capital costs, including equipment or real estate purchases / renovations; 
• Film production or post-production.

To Submit a Letter of Inquiry

Letters of inquiry should be up to five (5) pages in length.  Please do NOT submit supporting materials such as brochures, press clips, newsletters, and annual reports.

All letters of inquiry must include:

• Full contact information, including principal contact name, mailing address, phone, fax, and email;
• Brief organizational description;
• Description of the organization's track record in advancing the priorities of the campaign, around its core priorities of education, family, and work, within its targeted regions;
• Total organizational budget and amount requested;
• Description of the project for which funds are sought, including a specific description of how the project's goals will be achieved;
• Description of how the proposed work will advance the organization's broader mission;
• List of any confirmed or potential project partners; and
• Preliminary project budget.

Incomplete inquiries will NOT be considered.

Deadline

CBMA accepts inquiries on a rolling basis. You will be notified within two to four weeks that your request has been received. Please allow approximately one to three months for a decision on your inquiry, at which time you will receive a letter of declination or an invitation to submit a full proposal.

Submission

Please email letter of inquiry and preliminary budget to LOI-CBMA@sorosny.org. CBMA requests that all materials be submitted electronically in Word (.doc), Excel (.xls) or Adobe Acrobat (.pdf) format.