At Illinois Humanities, we consider ourselves fortunate to partner with a growing number of community-based cultural groups across the state of Illinois to support their work in the humanities and arts. One of the ways we do this is through our grants program, which in recent years has grown to include COVID-19 emergency relief funding, Envisioning Justice, the Foreground Rural Initiative, and General Operating Grants.
There are multiple ways to join our grants program or continue working with Illinois Humanities in 2023. Learn more about available grants below, their requirements, and deadlines. We hope, as always, to grow Illinois Humanities’ community of nonprofit organizations and individual culture makers and humanists whose work makes the public humanities accessible and sustainable for all Illinoisans.
Our team is available to answer questions and provide feedback on proposed projects ahead of each grant deadline. For Community Grants and Activate History micro-grants, feel free to email Mark Hallett at mark.hallett@ilhumanities.org or Joanne Hsu at joanne.hsu@ilhumanities.org. With questions on Envisioning Justice grants, reach out to Tyreece Williams at tyreece.williams@ilhumanities.org.
Community Grants
Vision and Action grants provide project-based support for nonprofit organizations based in or working in Illinois. General Operating grants provide unrestricted funds for organizations to utilize toward areas of greatest need.
Vision Grants
- Amount: $2,000; Plus:
- Accessibility stipend: $150
- Photography and documentation stipend: $100
- Goal: These grants fund humanities-focused organizations to take on planning, evaluation, and DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusiveness) projects
- Who’s Eligible: Illinois tax-exempt nonprofit organizations (not necessarily 501c3). Priority is given to organizations with budgets of less than $1 million.
- Example: Chicago Books to Women in Prison surveyed and hosted focus groups with their stakeholders to better understand their reading interests as well as explore better delivery systems to improve their free programs
- Cycles: Two grant cycles annually
- Deadlines: Jan. 17, 2023, and May 15, 2023, at 5:00 p.m. CST
Action Grants
- Amount: $4,000; Plus:
- Accessibility stipend: $150
- Photography and documentation stipend: $100
- Goal: These grants support nonprofits to take on public humanities projects, target and engage with new audiences, and experiment with new tools and platforms
- Who’s Eligible: Illinois tax-exempt nonprofit organizations (not necessarily 501c3). Priority is given to organizations with budgets of less than $1 million.
- Example: Freeport Public Library’s “One Book, One Freeport” event series produced free public events about Shelton Johnson’s novel “Gloryland”
- Cycles: Two grant cycles annually
- Deadlines: Jan. 17, 2023, and May 15, 2023, at 5:00 p.m. CST
General Operating Grants
- Amount: $10,000 as of June 1, 2023
- Who’s Eligible: Illinois tax-exempt nonprofit organizations (not necessarily 501c3). Priority is given to organizations with budgets of less than $250,000
- Goal: To provide unrestricted support to smaller public humanities-focused organizations based in Illinois and offer the flexibility for grantees to utilize funds however it will make the most impact toward their mission.
- Example: The Mitchell Museum of the American Indian in Evanston utilized a general operating grant to fund things like payroll, utilities, and facility fees that many grant opportunities restrict.
- Cycles: One annually
- Deadline: September 15, 2023, at 5:00 p.m. CST
Activate History Micro-grants
Activate History grants are small grants that provide a boost in resources for local history projects.
- Amount: $750; Plus:
- Accessibility stipend: $150
- Photography and documentation stipend: $100
- Goal: To support stewards of local historical archives and/or collections and opportunities for audiences to engage with local history.
- Who’s Eligible:
- Individual archivists, historians, cultural workers, and other stewards of local history
- Illinois tax-exempt nonprofit organizations (not necessarily 501c3). Priority is given to organizations with budgets of less than $400,000
- Example: History on Wheels (H.O.W.) received an Activate History grant to continue their mobile exhibit, “From Slavery to Soldier,” in Will County.
- Cycles: Two grant cycles annually
- Deadlines: Mar 1, 2023, and Sept. 1, 2023, at 5:00 p.m. CST
Envisioning Justice grants
Envisioning Justice grants provide project-based support for individuals and nonprofit organizations utilizing the arts and humanities in a variety of ways to explore alternatives to the U.S. criminal legal system and empower communities affected by mass incarceration.
- Amounts:
- Individuals: $5,000
- Organizations: $10,000; Plus:
- Accessibility stipend: $150
- Photography and documentation stipend: $100
- Goal: To support projects that address the injustices of mass incarceration, and that expand our collective imagination of what is possible through the arts and humanities
- Who’s Eligible:
- Illinois tax-exempt nonprofit organizations (not necessarily 501c3). Priority is given to organizations with budgets of less than $1 million
- Individual artists, educators, humanists, organizers, and others
- Examples:
- Chicago Torture Justice Memorials received funding to support a pedagogical project using sites of state violence across the City of Chicago to engage residents in Chicago’s history of police torture.
- Educator and community organizer Renaldo Hudson created “Chasing Hearts,” a series of virtual, public, and pre-recorded speaking events about topics related to mass incarceration, policing, and reentry.
- Cycles: One annually
- Deadline: Friday, July 14, 2023, at 5:00 p.m. CST
- Applications will open on Monday, May 15, 2023
We understand that many of the cultural leaders we work with wear six or seven hats on a regular basis (fundraiser, visionary, chief curator, but also coffee maker, event greeter, and more!) and we continue to explore the ways that we can provide valuable support for our grantee partners. There are a variety of opportunities available to new and continuing partners that receive funding from Illinois Humanities to network and build their capacity in key areas, and we hope to create more.
- Meet and Greets: We offer a virtual “meet and greet” for all our grantee partners after a grants cycle has closed for new and returning partners to get to know each other and their work.
- Grantee Partner Newsletter: This new bimonthly email newsletter features upcoming events hosted by grantee partners, as well as community news, awards, calls to action, and other grants and funding resources.
- First Fridays: Gabrielle Lyon, our executive director, hosts First Fridays, a monthly virtual office hour with executive directors to discuss the challenges that cultural nonprofits and their leadership face and share tools and resources.
- Capacity Building Workshops: Last year, we hosted capacity building workshops which are now all viewable on our YouTube channel.
- Envisioning Justice Digest and convenings: The Envisioning Justice program produces a bimonthly email newsletter sharing grantee partner news and events. We also host workshops and statewide convenings. Keep an eye out for more!
By the numbers: Securing an Illinois Humanities grant
If you’re interested in knowing the likelihood of securing funding from any of the above categories, here is the percentage of applicants who were funded in each in 2022: Vision grants (14%), Action grants (26%), General Operating (9%), Activate History (74%), and Envisioning Justice (38%).
However, these statistics are not benchmarks. Based on available funding and our goals to support work that reaches all the geographic corners of our state, our grant distribution looks different each year.
Interview Applications are now available!
Illinois Humanities’ grants team began offering grant applications and final grant reports by interview in 2020. As our availability to conduct interviews is unfortunately limited, this opportunity is available on a first-come, first-served basis for individuals and smaller cultural organizations. We have really enjoyed getting to know our partners this way! We will arrange a time, you come prepared with thoughts on how you would fill out all the application fields, and we work together on the application on a Zoom call. It’s that easy! Reach out to our team if this format would be helpful for you or your organization.
What is Gen Ops, anyway? General Operating grants, or unrestricted grants, are meant to support organizations to do what they do, without strings attached. Whereas a project grant is generally tied to specific goals, budget, timeline, and activities, General Operating grants are, in a sense, open, to be used to advance your mission on your terms.
Can my organization apply for more than one grant? The one restriction to applying for multiple grants applies to individuals or organizations with an open Community Grant, i.e., Vision, Action, or Gen Ops grant. If this is the case, you cannot apply for another Community Grant until you have closed out your open grant with a final report. In other words, if you have an Action grant, you must wait to apply for Gen Ops support until that first grant is closed out.
This restriction does not apply to our other grant categories. You may apply for both an Activate History microgrant and Envisioning Justice grant, say, or an Envisioning Justice grant and a Vision grant. Sound confusing? Reach out to us for clarity before beginning your application to ensure your eligibility.
What doesn’t Illinois Humanities fund? We don’t fund alcoholic beverages, businesses or for-profit companies, capital projects, endowment campaigns, foreign travel, lobbying, major equipment purchases, or programming outside of the humanities. If you have questions or concerns about a project budget and what to include, please get in touch with our team.
Who do we reach out to with questions? For Community Grants, feel free to email Mark Hallett (mark.hallett@ilhumanities.org) or Joanne Hsu (joanne.hsu@ilhumanities.org). With questions on Envisioning Justice grants, reach out to Tyreece Williams (tyreece.williams@ilhumanities.org).
About Illinois Humanities
Illinois Humanities, the Illinois affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities, is a statewide nonprofit organization that activates the humanities through free public programs, grants, and educational opportunities that foster reflection, spark conversation, build community and strengthen civic engagement. We provide free, high-quality humanities experiences throughout Illinois, particularly for communities of color, individuals living on low incomes, counties and towns in rural areas, small arts and cultural organizations, and communities highly impacted by mass incarceration. Founded in 1974, Illinois Humanities is supported by state, federal, and private funds.
Learn more at ilhumanities.org and on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn @ILHumanities.