Deadline to apply for next Awesome Foundation Grant is May 24th
Next grant submission deadline: Sunday, May 24th
Have an idea to make DC more awesome? Watch this grant applicant guide and apply for a $1,000 grant!
We are a giving circle collective of DC residents who help fund a wide specrtrum of amazing arts, culture, and community experiences, ranging from the founding Funk Parade to the Indiana Jones and The Alley of Doom to DC Bike Party's Sound Bike to Hand-Dancing, a DC-originated style of Swing dancing to skateboarding Santa Clauses to recycled flower arrangements for senior centers, community groups and low-income housing to community hackathons to literacy programs at local laundromats to community gardens to DC community youth literacy projects to Floor Charts tracking Congressional charts (so DC!).
Our group and grant winners have been featured in The New York Times, The BBC, NPR, WAMU, 730DC, The Hill Rag, Fox 5, Brightest Young Things, PBS Newshour, Huffington Post, The Washington Post, DCist, Washington City Paper, Brightest Young Things (again!), DCist (again!), CBS WUSA 9, Washingtonian, Washington City Paper (again!), Advancing Philanthropy Magazine, DC Inno, Washington Post (again!), and at Creative Mornings DC.
We are entirely volunteer-run and self-funded from Trustees and use the following four evaluation criteria for funding projects that help the city of Washington DC be more awesome. Any grant applicant should answer and address these four areas:
#1 - Is it awesome? (Is it unique? Interesting? Impactful? There's all sorts of types of awesome.)
#2 - Does it directly benefit the city of Washington DC? (We put heavy weight on supporting our tiny city/state and the awesomeness within. Fyi, there are Awesome North Virginia and Baltimore chapters, so if your project is focused on those regions you might consider applying there.)
#3 - Will $1,000 make an actual impact? (Some organizations are super-well funded so we focus on helping individuals and small groups to fund new, small but mighty projects that $1,000 will actually make a difference.)
#4 - Is it immediately actionable? (Similar to the actual impact, we heavily prefer projects that are a month or two away, so that the money can create immediate awesome impact in the community. If your project is a year away, wait to apply for a better chance at getting the grant.)