Alfred P. Sloan Foundation

• Work in basic science, economic research, STEM higher education or public understanding of science fits the Foundation's stated programmes, but it does not fund religion, medical research, humanities research, pre-college work outside its New York City initiative, building or laboratory costs, endowments or fundraising.
• Most grants are substantial rather than small: about 8 in 10 fall between $48,000 and $425,000, with a median of $170,000, so a request near the lower end of that typical band is a sensible starting point, though the largest grant was $6,000,000 and Books proposals go up to $60,000.
• Start by identifying the right programme, then email a letter of inquiry to its programme director, since only promising inquiries are invited to submit a formal proposal, and Books proposals are reviewed three times a year.
• Expect rigorous review that may include independent expert review and requests for revisions.
• In the filing, 84% of grant dollars to organisations went to organisations the Foundation had funded before, so a relationship-led approach may count for more than a cold one, but no geographic focus is stated, so location alone is not a bar.

The largest grants to organisations in the foundation’s latest filing:

• Carnegie Mellon University · To study the techno-economics of critical industries and their supply chains
  $1,479,0242024 tax year
• Peri Support Fund · To improve the availability, accessibility, and accuracy of data on the u.s. care economy
  $1,332,9672024 tax year
• Convergent Research · To make mathematics more reliable, searchable, understandable, and accessible by developing open source proof-assistant software of great value for research, applications, and education
  $1,030,7882024 tax year
• Research Foundation Of The City University Of Ny · To provide research experience and mentoring to promising students transferring from cuny community colleges to cuny senior colleges
  $1,025,6212024 tax year
• National Action Council for Minorities in Engineering · To administer scholarships for the sloan indigenous graduate partnership (sigp) program
  $1,001,0002024 tax year
• University of California Santa Cruz · To launch a sustainable network of open source program offices across the university of california system
  $925,7752024 tax year
• Harvard University · To enable the safe analysis of private data by expanding both an open-source library of software tools as well as a growing community of users
  $875,4192024 tax year
• University of California Berkeley · To improve the user experience (ux) of scientific software through development of an open source design system, infrastructure for collaborative prototyping on user interfaces, and training curriculum
  $843,3192024 tax year

Grants to organisations listed in the foundation’s Form 990-PF filings. Grants to individuals are not shown.

Figures from the foundation’s IRS Form 990-PF filings. Assets are at fair market value at year end. The document icon links to each year’s filing on ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer.