Call for Proposals: RGK Foundation Grants

Program Description

The RGK Foundation awards grants in the broad areas of Education, Community,and Medicine and Health.

The foundation’s primary interests within the Education area include programs that focus on formal K-12 education (particularly mathematics, science, and reading), teacher development, literacy, and higher education.

Within the funding area of Community, the foundation supports a broad range of human services, community improvement, abuse prevention, and youth development programs. Human service programs of particular interest to the foundation include children and family services, early childhood development, and parenting education. The foundation supports a variety of community improvement programs including those that enhance nonprofit management and promote philanthropy and voluntarism. Youth development programs supported by the foundation typically include after-school educational enrichment programs that supplement and enhance formal education systems to increase the chances for successful outcomes in school and life. The foundation is also interested in programs that attract female and minority students into the fields of mathematics, science, and technology.

The foundation’s current interests in the area of Medicine and Health include programs that promote the health and well-being of children, programs that promote access to health services, and foundation-initiated programs focusing on Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS).

Award Amount

RGK generally gives one-time awards averaging $25K, but does accept requests for funding over this amount.  However, applications submitted for dollar amounts over $100K will be given extra scrutiny both in UCI’s internal review and, if allowed to go forward, at the foundation level.  We recommend that a proposed budget be within the average range.

Internal Application Instructions

UC Irvine may submit only 1 electronic Letter of Intent (LOI) to the RGK foundation every 12 months. Therefore, I am requesting that preliminary applications containing the following be sent to my office (via electronic submission to or@research.uci.edu) by August 4, 2014:

  • Brief project description (1-2 pages max) that includes at least 3 specific measurable goals,
  • Indicate the program area that best fits your project (from the selections below):
    • COMMUNITY-Abuse  Prevention  and  Services-Child  Abuse  Prevention
    • COMMUNITY-Arts  and  Culture
    • COMMUNITY-Human  Services
    • COMMUNITY-Youth  Development
    • EDUCATION-Higher  Education
    • EDUCATION-K-12  Education
    • EDUCATION-Literacy
    • EDUCATION-Special  Education
    • MEDICINE-Health  Education  and/or  Services
  • Budget indicating how funds will be allocated and how much of the funds for the project will be requested from the foundation (if not 100%),
  • Clearly indicate whether the requested funds will be used to establish, sustain or expand the project,
  • Abbreviated CV or biosketch (no more than two pages),
  • Support letter from the Dean (or the equivalent in units without a Dean).

If necessary, an ad hoc committee will convene to review preliminary proposals. The RGK foundation does not have a specific deadline to meet, and full proposals are by invitation only, but the internal review will be conducted expediently and the selected candidate will be notified 2-3 weeks after the internal application deadline passes.

For more information about this opportunity, please refer to http://www.rgkfoundation.org/public/guidelines.  Questions about our internal campus review process may be directed to Greg Ruth at greg.ruth@uci.edu or x4-0372.
John C. Hemminger
Vice Chancellor for Research

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