Alfred P. Sloan Foundation – Economics Grant Program
Deadline: Continuous Submission/No deadline
Objectives: The Sloan Foundation has an economics program which supports basic research with applications that promote equity, protect consumers, strengthen institutions, incentivize innovation, test technologies, and improve the value of scientific research. They support academic risk-takers and entrepreneurs whose insights can empower communities, states, and countries to manage adversity and build better futures. Sloan's Economics Program seeks to empower more researchers and more institutions who can accelerate progress and strengthen inclusive prosperity.
Grants made in this program are especially:
- Policy relevant, but neither "policy research" nor advocacy;
- Motivated by nonideological questions rather than preconceived answers;
- Engaged with fundamental puzzles, but using fresh approaches;
- Unbiased, statistically sound, careful about causality, and replicable;
- Careful about baselines, controls, confounding variables, and econometrics;
- Savvy about markets, institutions, regulation, transaction costs, behavioral biases, etc.;
- Contributors to research infrastructure, datasets, or resources for general use;
- Generators of highly cited and catalytic results in high-quality journals; and
- Ultimately concerned with the quality of life in the United States.
Spencer Foundation – Vision Grant
6-12 Month Planning Grant
Funding Amounts: Up to $75k
200-Word Abstract Deadline: Aug. 13
Full Proposal Deadline: Sept. 17
Objectives: The Vision Grants program funds the collaborative planning of innovative, methodologically diverse, interdisciplinary research on education that contributes to transforming education systems for equity. Vision Grants are research planning grants to bring together a team, for 6 to 12 months, to collaboratively develop ambitious, large-scale research projects focused on transforming educational systems toward greater equity. This program takes as core that visionary, interdisciplinary, and collaborative research projects require time, space, and thoughtfulness to incubate and plan.
While the Vision Grant program stands on its own to spark research ideas and collaborations, being awarded a Vision Grant is also a prerequisite for applying to our Transformative Research Grant program (TRG, $3.5 million), which is designed for large-scale research projects that transform education systems for equity.
Allen Foundation – Grants Program
Deadline: Jan. 15, 2026
Objectives: Grants are limited under the terms of the foundation's charter to projects that primarily benefit programs for human nutrition in the areas of health, education, training, and research.
The priorities are:
- To make grants to fund relevant nutritional research.
- To support programs for the education and training of mothers during pregnancy and after the birth of their children, so that good nutritional habits can be formed at an early age.
- To assist in the training of persons to work as educators and demonstrators of good nutritional practices.
- To encourage the dissemination of information regarding healthful nutritional practices and habits.
- In limited situations to make grants to help solve immediate emergency hunger and malnutrition problems.
Hearst Foundations – Grants Program
Funding Amounts: $100,k
Deadline: Rolling applications accepted throughout the calendar year
Objectives: The Hearst Foundations are national philanthropic resources for organizations working in the fields of culture, education, health and social services. The Hearst Foundations identify and fund outstanding nonprofits to ensure that people of all backgrounds in the United States have the opportunity to build healthy, productive and satisfying lives.
Whitehall Foundation, Inc. – Research Grants
Funding Amounts: $300k / 3-year study
Deadline: Sept. 1, 2025
Objectives: The Whitehall Foundation is focused exclusively on assisting basic research in vertebrate (excluding clinical) and invertebrate neurobiology. They offer research grants to established scientists of all ages working at accredited institutions in the United States. Research grants of up to three years are available. A renewal grant with a maximum of two years is possible, but it will be awarded on a competitive basis.
The Foundation is currently interested in basic research in neurobiology, defined as follows: Invertebrate and vertebrate (excluding clinical) neurobiology, specifically investigations of neural mechanisms involved in sensory, motor, and other complex functions of the whole organism as these relate to behavior. The overall goal should be to better understand behavioral output or brain mechanisms of behavior.
For more information, please contact the Office of Sponsored Programs at ospgrants@hartford.edu.