Innovation Grants

Upper $25,000USD Lower $5,000USD RMYF expects to fund between 5 and 10 grants.

Innovation Grants aim to help undiscovered organizations at a point in their evolution where the amount of funding offered by the grants still makes a meaningful contribution towards becoming sustainable long-term. If an organization has more than $1 million in annual revenue or receive any grants over $100,000 from government entities or large philanthropic organizations, it has likely outgrown RMYF grants.Applicants must be small or medium nonprofit organizations (operating budget of up to $1 million). RMYF gives preference to smaller nonprofit organizations, such as organizations with up to $1 million in annual revenue.Applicants must be US-based organizations with IRS nonprofit status.Applicants must operate in one of these geographic areas: Boston, MA, Los Angeles, CA, Milwaukee, WI, San Francisco, CA, and Washington, DC.Applicants must offer innovative programs or services designed help underprivileged youth reach their full potential.

Innovation Grants support innovative services for helping underprivileged youth reach their full potential. Innovation Grants are available to youth-serving nonprofit organizations within RMYF geographic areas and can be for as much as $25,000.RMYF seeks to support programs that:
- Are innovative and have a potentially replicable service concept.
- Promote scholastic, professional, athletic and/or other excellence in disadvantaged youth (0-25 years old).
- Provide youth with new opportunities for health, personal growth and success.
- Are located in the greater metropolitan areas of Boston, Los Angeles, Milwaukee, San Francisco and Washington, DC.Following Albert Einstein's dictum, "If at first the idea is not absurd, then there is no hope for it," Innovation Grants support ideas that might easily appear radical or preposterous. The grants will support innovative programs or services designed help underprivileged youth reach their full potential. Innovative is defined as "uncommon, untested or otherwise unconventional" In other words, RMYF funds programs or services that are outside of current customary practices.Innovative services RMYF has funded include the following:
- Credit union savings projects
- An intensive weekend tutoring program for at-risk students
- Book club for incarcerated youth that uses reading and writing to help them to envision a future that does not end with a cycle of incarceration or early death
- Neighborhood tour guide program
- Yoga program that works with the entire school community to create a less stressful and more mindful school learning environment
- A program that provides talented, experienced teachers with support, incentives and a professional environment to help make teaching in low-performing schools a viable long-term employment option
- Civic engagement after-school program in Spanish that includes an English language learning component. Eligibility Innovation Grants aim to help undiscovered organizations at a point in their evolution where the amount of funding offered by the grants still makes a meaningful contribution towards becoming sustainable long-term. If an organization has more than $1 million in annual revenue or receive any grants over $100,000 from government entities or large philanthropic organizations, it has likely outgrown RMYF grants.Applicants must be small or medium nonprofit organizations (operating budget of up to $1 million). RMYF gives preference to smaller nonprofit organizations, such as organizations with up to $1 million in annual revenue.Applicants must be US-based organizations with IRS nonprofit status.Applicants must operate in one of these geographic areas: Boston, MA, Los Angeles, CA, Milwaukee, WI, San Francisco, CA, and Washington, DC.Applicants must offer innovative programs or services designed help underprivileged youth reach their full potential.