The Steele-Reese Foundation is seeking applications for its Appalachian Kentucky Grant Program to support Rural Education, Rural Human/Social Services, Rural Conservation and Preservation, Rural Health, and Rural Arts and Humanities projects.
Donor Name: The Steele-Reese Foundation
State: Kentucky
County: Selected Counties
Type of Grant: Grant
Deadline: 03/01/2023
Size of the Grant: up to $50,000
Details:
The highest priority of the Appalachian Kentucky Grant Program is ensuring that children leave the third-grade able to read and write on grade level; and that children leaving middle school can perform mathematics on grade level. Additional priorities include improving school libraries, providing supplemental materials to aid learning; elementary, middle, and high school programs that improve outcomes for students; support of literacy programs and out-of-school services. At this time, they are not funding higher education or adult education programs. All proposals must be specific in identifying a rationale for funding, set out clear steps for execution of the work, and articulate measurable outcomes
Funding Information
The minimum grant awarded by the Foundation is $5,000. They rarely make grants of up to $50,000 for a single year or make multi-year grants.
What they Fund
In the Appalachian Kentucky Grant Program, The Steele-Reese Foundation is limiting its 2023 grant-making to:
- Elementary and secondary education
- Early childhood education programs, and
- Public libraries providing programs for children from early childhood through high school.
Counties that will be given preference are those declared as disaster areas by Gov. Andy Beshear. These are: Breathitt, Clay, Floyd, Knott, Lee, Leslie, Letcher, Magoffin, Martin, Owsley, Perry, Pike and Whitley.
Flood-related proposals should address ongoing problems with flood-affected schools, including loss of educational materials or equipment, social services or health needs arising from the effects of flooding.
Steele-Reese continues its commitment to supporting teachers and administrators who are dedicated to improving educational attainment in Kentucky’s Appalachian mountain communities.
Criteria Applicant Organization Type
- No grants are made to individuals or to entities that have not been recognized as federally tax-exempt by the Internal Revenue Service. The Foundation considers requests from 501(c) 3 organizations and from governmental entities or agencies such as schools, fire departments, and libraries.
Guidelines
- The criteria that follow relate to each of the program areas listed above and offer guidance to prospective applicants.
Proposed projects should:
- Serve rural areas
- Help people to help themselves
- Be modest and direct in aim
- Be narrow in function
- Be based on experience
- Demonstrate community financial, in-kind, or other support
- Be essential, rather than merely desirable
- Yield a direct and measurable, rather than a remote, benefit to people
- Be conducted by competent, practical organizations and managers and demonstrate strong leadership capacity at both the organizational and program level
The Foundation will not consider proposals for support of projects to assist with any of the following:
- Endowment funds
- Emergencies
- Community funds and charity drives
- Conferences and workshops or their related travel
- Documentaries
- Efforts to influence elections directly or indirectly
- Planning, research, experimental, or untested projects
- Athletic or academic competitions, or related travel
- Summer camps
- Efforts to promulgate religious or political beliefs or agendas
For more information, visit Appalachian Kentucky Grant Program.
