OVERVIEW: The New York City-based Sloan Foundation supports a broad array of research initiatives in basic, applied and social sciences. It also supports diversity in higher education, science- and technology-themed arts and culture projects and various nonprofits in New York City.
IP TAKE: The Sloan Foundation is an iconic funder of scientific research. In recent years, the foundation has increased its support of the applied and social sciences, particularly in the areas of clean energy and economics. More than half of its grantmaking goes to leading research universities and institutes of technology in the U.S. The foundation has also partnered with over 20 universities to run programs that aim to increase the success of students from underrepresented groups in STEM graduate programs. Other areas of grantmaking interest include science- and technology-themed film, theater and book projects and nonprofits working in health and education in New York City.
The Sloan Foundation is accessible and accepts two-page letters of inquiry for some of its programs, but note that grantmaking is highly competitive. Guidelines and requirements vary by program. The foundation is also responsive, though not always approachable.
PROFILE: Founded in 1934 by General Motors executive Alfred Sloan, the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation has grown into one of the largest private foundations in the United States. This funder’s stated mission is to “to support original research and education related to science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and economics,” but its work includes grantmaking for climate change, arts and culture and journalism and a range of special projects in New York City. The Sloan Foundation’s current grantmaking programs are research, higher education, technology, public understanding and New York City.
Grants for STEM and Higher Education
The Sloan Foundation’s higher education grantmaking program aims to “create diverse, equitable, and inclusive pathways to and through STEM graduate education and the professoriate.” The foundation’s strategic priorities for the program include removing systemic barriers to STEM graduate programs, promoting practices that lead to equitable outcomes in graduate education, developing cultures of equity and opportunity in academic departments and collaborating with other organizations and public agencies toward equitable change in STEM education. Sloan currently runs three higher education sub-initiatives:
The University Centers of Exemplary Mentoring Program provided funding to eight leading universities for a collaborative program to “improve the recruitment, retention, and graduation of Black Indigenous, and Latina/o doctoral students in STEM fields.” Participating universities include Cornell, Duke, the Georgia Institute of Technology, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Penn State, the University of California at San Diego and the University of South Florida
Sloan’s Indigenous Graduate Partnership, similarly, partners with universities to “recruit, train, and graduate American Indian and Alaska Native students in STEM graduate programs.” Funding has supported the creation of “regional centers” that offer mentoring, professional development and fellowships, scholarships and other forms of financial support to indigenous students. Partner universities include the University of Alaska campuses at Anchorage and Fairbanks, the University of Arizona, the University of Montana, Montana State University, Montana Tech, the University of North Carolina Asheville and Purdue University.
Sloan’s Creating Equitable Pathways to STEM Graduate Education funding program provides grants of up to $500,000 to Minority Serving Institutions to create pathways from undergraduate to graduate programs in astronomy, biology, chemistry, computer science, data science, earth sciences, economics, engineering, marine science, mathematics, physics and statistics. Programs that aim to improve the quality of undergraduate programs, involve undergraduate students in research, provide mentoring opportunities and remove systemic barriers to graduate education have been funded. Grantees include Howard University, Eckerd College and the University of Southern California.
In addition to its work with university consortia, the Sloan Foundation supports individual scholars through the Sloan Research Fellowships, which are awarded annually in the amount of $75,000 to “early career scientists and scholars of outstanding promise” in the fields of “chemistry, computer science, Earth system science, economics, mathematics, neuroscience, physics, or a related field.” The foundation runs an open application program for these fellowships, but candidates must be nominated by their institutions.
The Sloan Foundation also supports institutions of higher education via the Economic Institutions, Behavior, and Performance sub-initiative of its research program. The foundation’s work in this area aims to fund rigorous research that has the potential to “inform and strengthen decision-making by regulators, policymakers, and the public. Areas of interest include behavioral economics, economic analysis of science and technology, empirical economic research enablers and support for administrative data research facilities. One recent grant supported a study of the economics of online misinformation at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Another grant supported a collaborative project at Oxford and Harvard Universities on comparative household finance. Other grantees include Columbia, Cornell and the University of Maryland at College Park.
Grants for Science Research
The Sloan Foundation’s research funding program seeks to support projects “led by outstanding individuals or teams, which exhibit a high degree of methodological rigor, which have a high expected return to society, and for which funding from the private sector, government, or other foundations is not yet widely available.” The foundation has traditionally prioritized basic scientific research, but has, in recent years, extended its grantmaking to support applied scientific research, social science research and engineering projects in select areas of interest. The research program’s current sub-initiatives are economics, energy and environment and fundamental physics. A majority of recent grants have supported research in the area of clean energy development and distribution, industrial decarbonization and “negative emissions technologies.” Princeton University received $1.5 million for field research with the goal of quantifying emissions from wastewater and agricultural waste systems. In a recent year, the foundation also supported research on carbon dioxide and methane air capture technologies at the Universities of Arkansas, Rochester, Wisconsin, Virginia, Colorado and California.
The Sloan Foundation’s research program runs a signature program, the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, a spectroscopic observation program that aims to map and study the universe. The initiative is conducted in partnership with the Astrophysical Research Consortium and the Carnegie Observatories and conducts research using the Sloan Foundation Telescope at the Apache Point Observatory in New Mexico and the Irénée du Pont telescope at Las Campanas Observatories in Chile. The program’s current projects include the Milky Way Mapper, the Black Hole Mapper and the Local Volume Mapper, which studies “the dust and gas that lies within and between galaxies to help improve understanding about how galaxies evolve.”
Grants for Climate Change and Clean Energy
Climate change and clean energy have become areas of increasing importance among the Sloan Foundation’s areas of grantmaking interest. The foundation’s energy and environment subprogram accounts for more than half of all grantmaking stemming from the foundation’s research initiative. Specific areas of recent interest include research on energy markets and policy, negative emissions technology innovation, transportation, equitable energy distribution, industrial decarbonization and the adaptation of energy systems to the changing climate. Grantmaking supports research, training and education, collaborations and knowledge dissemination. The State University of New York at Buffalo recently received funding for research on “how communities and stakeholders perceive negative emissions technologies and solar radiation management technologies.” Another recipient, Pecan Street, Inc., used funding to test residential energy use monitoring systems through its Center for Race, Energy and Climate Justice. Sloan’s grants have also supported research on climate change and clean energy at Auburn University, Yale University, the National Bureau of Economic Research, the Colorado School of Mines and the National Council for Science and the Environment.
Grants for Journalism
The Sloan Foundation supports journalism via the radio, television and new media sub-initiatives of its Public Understanding grantmaking program, which aims to bring information about advances in science and technology to the general public through a variety of media. Journalism-related grants generally support public media outlets and production companies that create innovative broadcast and podcast production with broad appeal. Past radio grantees include the public radio shows Science Friday and RadioLab. Television grantees include New York’s WNET, the WGBH Educational Foundation and the Greater Washington Educational Telecommunications Association. The foundation’s new media initiative supported a large-scale project by Consumer Reports to “build and apply tools and research methodologies to map the collection, manipulation, and sharing of consumer data across three industries.”
Grants for Arts and Culture
Sloan’s Public Understanding funding program names books, film and theater as areas of interest. Grantmaking in these areas also focuses on themes of science and technology in works of fiction and nonfiction. In a recent year, Women Make Movies received a grant for the production of a documentary film about the ethical implications of artificial intelligence. Another recent grant supported the Leon Levy Center for Biography at the City University of New York for research for “three new major biographies of scientists and/or technologists.” Other recent grants have supported the American Film Institute, the American Museum of the Moving Image, L.A. Theatre Works and Circle X Theatre’s reading and recording of Louis Slotin Sonata, a play that tells the story of Slotin’s accidental death by radiation poisoning while he was working on the Manhattan Project.
Grants for Racial Justice and Indigenous Rights
Sloan supports racial justice and indigenous rights through its higher education grantmaking program, which partners with universities on programs that help African American, Latino/a, Indigenous and other underrepresented groups pursue and complete graduate study in STEM disciplines. The foundation’s three programs include the University Centers of Exemplary Mentoring, the Sloan Indigenous Graduate Partnership and Creating Equitable Pathways to STEM Graduate Education. Participating universities include the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, the University of Alaska, Montana Tech and Purdue University.
Other Grantmaking Opportunities
The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation also supports a broad array of nonprofit organizations in New York City and provides annual funding for the Sloan Public Service Awards, which “recognizes six outstanding public servants in New York City” with $10,000 prizes. Recent New York City grantees include the CUNY’s Lehman College, the Fund for Public Health in New York, Girls Who Invest, the Urban Justice Center and the Mr. October Foundation, which runs an out-of-school STEM program at public schools in the Bronx.
Important Grant Details:
In recent years, Sloan’s grantmaking has ranged from about $80 to $100 million a year. Its grants range from $10,000 to $3 million, with an average grant size of about $100,000. This funder has traditionally supported scientific research but has recently branched out to support a broader range of issues, including research on clean energy, behavioral economics, film and STEM education. For additional information about Sloan’s recent grantmaking, see the foundation’s searchable grants database.
The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation currently accepts two-page letters of inquiry for its higher education, New York City and fellowship programs. Grantseekers should consult individual program pages for guidelines and application materials. Selected applicants will be invited to submit full proposals. General inquiries may be addressed to the foundation’s staff via email.
PEOPLE:
Search for staff contact info and bios in PeopleFinder (paid subscribers only).
LINKS: