The San Diego Women’s Foundation is accepting letters of inquiry (LOI) from eligible nonprofit organizations and will grant unrestricted funding to those working to expand affordable, accessible, and quality child care for infants and toddlers (ages 0-4 years).
Donor Name: San Diego Women’s Foundation (SDWF)
State: California
County: San Diego County (CA)
Type of Grant: Grant
Deadline: 11/20/2025
Size of the Grant: $10,000 to $100,000
Grant Duration: 2 Years
Details:
Access to quality, affordable child care is essential for healthy child development, family stability, and workforce participation among families. Affordable child care remains in critically short supply, leaving families, especially those furthest from opportunity, struggling to find safe and developmentally supportive options. The foundation will prioritize organizations that provide services to families and communities with the least access today, and whose efforts contribute to long-term, systemic improvements to the child care landscape. Areas of work that align with SDWF’s funding priorities include, but are not limited to:
- Increasing the long-term capacity of licensed child care in San Diego, especially in communities where availability is scarce.
- Enhancing business acumen and resilience among child care providers.
- Helping aspiring providers establish child care businesses (in-home, workplace- or community-based), including those providing culturally and linguistically responsive care.
- Enhancing professional training, continuing education, and collaboration opportunities for child care workers.
Funding Information
- The foundation is offering the option of one- or two-year grant terms, with a fixed grant amount of $60,000. This amount can be disbursed all in one year or split over two years ($30,000 per year).
- This grant cycle begins on July 1, 2026, with the one-year term ending on June 30, 2027, and the two-year term ending on June 30, 2028. SDWF expects to award between $175,000-$250,000 in June 2026.
Eligibility Criteria
- SDWF only funds nonprofit organizations with 501(c)(3) or an equivalent tax-exempt status, located in and/or serving San Diego County communities. They do not provide funding to for-profit organizations, applicants without a qualified fiscal sponsor, projects outside the San Diego region, or organizations that require service recipients to participate in religious activities.
- An organization may serve as a fiscal sponsor for another organization that does not have tax-exempt status if a cooperative relationship between the two can be clearly demonstrated. The fiscal sponsor must be willing to administer the grant if awarded. Note: if you have a fiscal sponsor, the sponsor organization must be listed on the application. Please verify with your fiscal sponsor that they are not involved in any other applications before submitting.
- Collaborative proposals, in which two or more organizations share funding and work jointly to implement a program or connected services, are eligible for funding. One organization must serve as the applicant: the application must be submitted under that organization’s name and 501(c)(3), and funds will be granted to that organization to be disbursed among collaborators.
- An organization may submit only one proposal. This includes collaborations and fiscal sponsors. If more than one proposal is submitted from the same organization, all proposals from that organization will be ineligible for funding. An organization that has received or currently is receiving funding from SDWF is eligible to apply.
For more information, visit SDWF.
