This grant program is open by invitation. If your organization has been invited to apply, please review the information below to submit your application. If you have a program or project that is a strong fit with the ELAEE, please feel free to submit a brief summary describing your work and send to grants@sonomacf.org. The Community Impact Team will contact you if there is a chance to explore further.
We are fortunate to live in a county filled with urban and rural parks and open spaces that give us the opportunity to explore majestic redwood forests, stunning wetlands, rolling hills, and rugged coastline. Yet there are many people in our community who do not have the opportunity to get outdoors, connect with and learn about nature—even when those places are right in their own backyard.
In order to foster informed, inspired lifelong environmental stewards who can address the environmental challenges we face now and in the future, there must be equitable opportunities for all members of our community to cultivate a connection to nature, and participate in protecting the environment. Community Foundation seeks to continue to address these disparities and expand access to typically underserved community members through this grants program open to both established and grassroots environmental organizations who share our commitment to equity.
The Grant Program
Community Foundation Sonoma County is committed to addressing issues of disparity in order to build an equitable community. Therefore, our Environmental Education grant program will focus primarily on high-quality environmental education experiences for young people who lack access and opportunities to experience the outdoors.
Grant Program Criteria include:
- Multiple visits (single-visit programs are ineligible for funding)
- Standards-based science curriculum
- Opportunities to cultivate a sense of connection and belonging in the outdoors
- Direct experiences as stewards of the natural world
- Inclusion of climate justice into the experience is encouraged
Environmental education curricula should be delivered by environmental organizations working in collaboration with classroom teachers to deliver experiences directly to elementary and/or secondary school students.
Timeline
- Tuesday, May 24, 2022: Grant application opens online
- Friday, June 10, 2022: Grant application closes at 5 p.m.
- Friday, June 24, 2022: Applicants informed of grant awards
How To Apply
This grant program is open by invitation. If your organization has been invited to apply, please review the information below to submit your application. If you have a program or project that is a strong fit with the ELAEE, please feel free to submit a brief summary describing your work and send to grants@sonomacf.org. The Community Impact Team will contact you if there is a chance to explore further.
For organizations invited to apply, please follow these instructions:
Community Foundation Sonoma County uses an online process for submitting grant applications. You can access the application through our portal at this link. If this is your first application using the online program, you will be asked to set up an account, provide your IRS Tax ID (or Fiscal Sponsor Tax ID) and take a short eligibility quiz.
If you have an established account, you will be asked for your password to either access existing application drafts or to open a new application.
Once you’ve opened an online account, you will be asked a series of question that include your contact information, funding request amount, and a series of narrative questions. We highly recommend that you complete your application in a Word document and then copy and paste the content into the online template; to download a Word version of the narrative questions for the application, click here.
Applicants will also be asked to upload the following documents (templates will be provided for those documents with an asterisk):
- Board of Directors List (or Board of Directors from Fiscal Sponsor)
- Organization and Project Budget Form*
- Fiscal Sponsorship Form (only for organizations using a Fiscal Sponsor)*
To review FAQs for Online Submission, please click here.
Our 2021 Environmental Education Grants
| Organization | Grant Purpose |
|---|---|
| Extended Child Care Coalition of Sonoma County Inc. | to support K-8 student participation in environment and nutrition programs at the Larkfield Community Garden/ Learning Center, as fiscal sponsor to Community Soil Foundation |
| Jack London Park Partners | to support the Fund-A-Need at the gala on September 25, 2021 |
| LandPaths | to support the In Our Own BackYard program |
| North Bay Organizing Project | to support the Latino Student Congress environmental education outings |
| Pepperwood Foundation | to support TeenNat, connecting youth to natural resource careers through participation in conservation research |
| Pepperwood Foundation | to support professional development for Sonoma Environmental Education Collaborative (SEEC), as fiscal sponsor |
| Point Reyes National Seashore Association | to support partnership with Sonoma Valley Mentoring Alliance to expand the Youth in Parks program |
| Sonoma County Regional Parks Foundation | to support the Environmental Education Modules |
| Sonoma Ecology Center | to support the K-12 Watershed Education program for Sonoma Valley youth |
| Sonoma Ecology Center | to support the capacity building implementation program |
| Sonoma Land Trust | to support the Conservation Council environmental science and youth development program |
This grant program is by invitation only. For more information about the Environmental Education grant program, please contact:
For questions about the online application process, please contact:
