Opportunities Grants

Sys­tems change is the ​“north star” of Cat­a­lyst grant­mak­ing impact. The Com­mu­ni­ty Foun­da­tion rec­og­nizes that sys­tems change takes time, part­ner­ships, and resources, and that it comes in iter­a­tions. We are pleased to part­ner with local orga­ni­za­tions in var­i­ous stages of sys­tems change work.

Oppor­tu­ni­ties Grants pri­or­i­tize fund­ing for com­pelling, high-impact pro­pos­als in the fol­low­ing order:

1. Sys­tems change work (dis­cussed here; also see Exam­ples of Sys­tems Change Work below)
2. Inno­va­tion with­in a system
3. Work that is crit­i­cal to meet a press­ing com­mu­ni­ty need (though pos­si­bly not sys­tems changing)

Pref­er­ences and Con­sid­er­a­tions

The strongest appli­ca­tions will feature:

• Com­pelling strat­e­gy for sys­tems change or oth­er inno­va­tion, sup­port­ed by data if available
• High like­li­hood of yield­ing mean­ing­ful impact 
• Strate­gic partnerships 
• Diver­si­ty of fund­ing sources and a plan for ongo­ing funding 
• Appli­cant has orga­ni­za­tion­al capac­i­ty, sta­bil­i­ty, respon­si­ble lead­er­ship, and a track record of pro­gram­mat­ic success 
• Align­ment with Com­mu­ni­ty Foun­da­tion’s Strate­gic Plan and Val­ues 

Exclu­sions

Pro­pos­als that have been fund­ed by the Com­mu­ni­ty Foun­da­tion or request­ed with­in the past 12 months may not be resubmitted.

The Com­mu­ni­ty Foun­da­tion is the major fun­der of One22 Resource Center’s Youth Enrich­ment Schol­ar­ship (YES) pro­gram. Youth pro­gram­ming schol­ar­ship requests will not be con­sid­ered through Cat­a­lyst Grants. Please con­nect with One22 Resource Cen­ter to become a YES partner.

• High-impact pro­gram­ming focused sig­nif­i­cant com­mu­ni­ty issues and their root caus­es (large num­bers or dis­pro­por­tion­ate­ly affect­ed pop­u­la­tions served)
• Capac­i­ty build­ing for orga­ni­za­tions to bet­ter meet the needs of under­served populations
• Imple­men­ta­tion of strate­gic plan­ning (not strate­gic plan­ning itself – think ​“Series B” funding) 
• Cap­i­tal expen­di­tures for orga­ni­za­tions sys­tem­i­cal­ly address­ing crit­i­cal com­mu­ni­ty needs (expen­di­ture must have broad and endur­ing com­mu­ni­ty ben­e­fit, or sig­nif­i­cant­ly sup­port pop­u­la­tions in need)
• Struc­tur­al changes with­in orga­ni­za­tions that will increase effi­cien­cy and impact in crit­i­cal ser­vice areas (e.g. non­prof­it mergers)

This is not a com­pre­hen­sive list. The Com­mu­ni­ty Foun­da­tion wel­comes pro­pos­als that bring inno­v­a­tive solu­tions to com­plex com­mu­ni­ty issues.

Fol­low­ing are exam­ples of past Oppor­tu­ni­ties Grants geared toward sys­tems change:

• $40,000 to address e‑bike safe­ty issues through best prac­tice research and the engage­ment of cross-juris­dic­tion­al path­way part­ners, law enforce­ment, and the pub­lic. Grantee: Friends of Path­ways in part­ner­ship with 20+ non­prof­it, gov­ern­ment, and busi­ness entities 

• $15,000 to sup­port Bridger-Teton Nation­al For­est Land Man­age­ment Plan revi­sions, which will have a gen­er­a­tional impact on for­est ser­vice access and use. Grantee: Wyoming Wildlife Asso­ci­a­tion, in part­ner­ship with 20+ con­ser­va­tion organizations

Total avail­able fund­ing for 2025 Oppor­tu­ni­ties Grants: up to $300,000

There is no spec­i­fied minimum/​maximum request. See Exam­ples of Sys­tems Change Work above for a ball­park range. 

We expect a total appli­cant pool request that exceeds what is avail­able to grant, mak­ing the appli­ca­tion process high­ly competitive. 

• July 8‑August 29
  • Devel­op pro­pos­al con­cept, solid­i­fy project partnerships
  • New in 2025: 30-minute meet­ing with Foun­da­tion staff to dis­cuss your pro­pos­al con­cept (required to sub­mit an Expres­sion of Inter­est in Sep­tem­ber). Our goal is to sup­port appli­cants and ensure pro­pos­als’ align­ment with Oppor­tu­ni­ties Grants. Request a meet­ing here.

• Sep­tem­ber 17 – 24: Expres­sion of Inter­est sub­mis­sion period
• Octo­ber 14: Expres­sion of Inter­est noti­fi­ca­tions; select orga­ni­za­tions advance to writ­ten application
• Octo­ber 16 – 30: Writ­ten appli­ca­tion period
• Decem­ber 4 – 9: 10-minute Q&A with review committee
• Decem­ber 10 – 12: Grant noti­fi­ca­tions
• Decem­ber 15-Jan­u­ary 15: Grant con­tract and disbursement

Grantees are asked to sub­mit a report after com­ple­tion of their grant-fund­ed work. Report­ing dates are cus­tomized to indi­vid­ual project time­lines. The Grant Report form focus­es on impact, eval­u­a­tion strate­gies, and bud­get alignment.

Grantees must adhere to the Foundation’s Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Require­ments For Grant Recip­i­ents.

Oppor­tu­ni­ties Grants are fund­ed by gen­er­ous pri­vate donors in sup­port of cat­alyt­ic com­mu­ni­ty advance­ments. A por­tion of fund­ing also comes from Old Bill’s CoChallengers. 

Please email grants@​cfjacksonhole.​org with ques­tions about Oppor­tu­ni­ties Grants.