We are excited to announce an experimental funding opportunity for inroads members! This round of funding can support projects between $1000 and $8000 USD, at two levels:

• Seed Grants – USD $1000 – $3000. Inroads Seed grants are designed to support the production or translation of tools and art projects for sharing with inroads members across the network. These projects may include:
  • Development and production of tools, trainings, or small interventions to be used with local groups and added to the growing inroads stigma-busting toolkit.
  • Translation: Costs for translation of a stigma tool or training that can be added to the inroads Collaboration Workspace or inroads stigma library as a resource for other members.
  • Arts and Arts-based Interventions: An arts or arts-based intervention focused on centering abortion stigma or gathering and connecting people for the purposes of addressing abortion stigma.
• Experimental Grants – USD $3001 – $8000. After reviewing proposals for both Seed and Partnership Fund levels over the past several rounds, the inroads team has observed a gap between the Seed grant level and the longer-term Partnership Fund level (next round anticipated in 2020) for more complex, multi-part  interventions, evaluations of efforts, advocacy campaigns and activities, or technical implementation. To address this gap  we created a new level of grant: The Experimental Grants. The “Experiment” comes partly from the fact that this is an experimental level of money for the inroads Partnership Fund and to encourage new types of experimentation in your work. We expect that projects at this level may include things like implementation of community, institutional, or policy change interventions to destigmatize abortion, group/collaborative campaigning, or longer term engagements.

All projects should result in efforts, tools, processes, or events that are easily shareable with other inroads members in the form of images, videos, tools, or lessons learned. The project period will be July 2019 – March 2020, and thus proposed projects should be planned to finish by or before March  30, 2020.

Eligibility

In order to apply for funding the following must be true:

• You are an individual, organization, network, coalition, or association who is a member of inroads. (Join here)
• You are proposing a project or effort that can be started and completed or reported on by March 30, 2020
• The project you are proposing specifically addresses abortion stigma and its mitigation and will be shared with inroads members. Safe abortion awareness raising will not be considered.
• Sensitization only outreach plans/interventions will not be as competitive as more interactive, applied methods.
• You are not part of a currently active inroads Partnership Funded grant.
• You are able to use the funds on a discrete effort, project, or deliverable
• You are an active, locally-based group who has a bank account that can legally receive wire-transferred funds from a US-based institution or you have a fiscal sponsorship with an entity that can legally receive wire-transferred funds from a US-based institution.

Application Process

To apply for this opportunity, please complete this application form. The application window will close by 11:59 pm UTC on 2^nd June 2019. Applications entered or sent through any other pathway/address after this time will not be considered. If you have any problems with the submission form, please email info@endabortionstigma.org. This email inbox will be monitored for questions Monday through Friday, East Coast US (EDT) business hours during the grant submission window.  

On the application form, please prepared to include the following:

1. Name or concept of project.
2. Region and/or language in which it will be developed.
3. Type of funding requested (Seed or Experimental)
4. Total funding amount requested
5. Proposed Project Manager.
6. Organizational contact information
   • Name of organization(s)
   • Address, Country, Telephone
   • Email address
   • Social media contact information (e.g. Facebook address, Twitter address)
7. Name and contact for fiscal sponsor, if applicable
8. Partners or groups who will be involved in the project with links to further information and background.
9. Audience of the tool or project: who will benefit from this project?
10. Concept Description. Be specific about the approach to understanding or reducing stigma.
11. How you plan to share product with other inroads members.
12. Proposed final product or deliverables.
13. Attachments to upload (Word, Excel, or PDF):
    • Timeline. Please include a project timeline. This can be a gantt chart or a simple table with activities and approximate dates.
      1. Please build in time for inroads content review and comment. Please assume at least a two-week turnaround for inroads staff to provide review and comment on products in English or Spanish, and three weeks for products in French.
      2. If you are producing a script-based art or media product, then please include time for inroads review of script or draft before final production.
      3. If you intend to include the inroads logo, review, comment, and final approval by inroads staff is required.
    • Budget. Please include a high level project budget. We don’t have a required budget template, since we encourage members to propose and report using budget templates that make sense for your work and organization. A sample template is available upon request.
14. Any other information you would like for inroads staff and steering committee to consider.

A NOTE ABOUT LANGUAGE: Using translation services, we are excited to be able to review project proposals and reports submitted in English, Spanish, or French. The inroads team is able to provide technical support or answer questions in English and Spanish, and will use Google Translate to support answers to questions in French.

Selection process

Written proposals will be reviewed by the inroads review panel and decisions will be made in consultation with the inroads Steering Committee. Applicants will be assessed on:

• Clarity and feasibility of approach
• Approach to understanding or reducing stigma
• Engagement with inroads Collaboration Workspace library and listserv
• Geographic diversity
• Diversity across the funding types

We anticipate making award notifications by June 17, 2019 so that projects may begin by July 15, 2019. If we receive more applications than anticipated, the review and notification process may take a bit longer. We are so excited to hear about your stigma-busting projects!

Tips and suggestions for stronger project proposals

Each round of inroads Partnership Fund opportunities is open to all inroads members (currently 1300+ members) and are quite competitive. Do understand that you may have a very strong proposal and still not receive funding in this round. There are a few things to consider that may strengthen your project:

• Demonstrate your understanding of stigma and how it operates in your context. Are you working on one or more levels of the ecological model? How do you think your approach might destigmatize abortion.
• Consider the intended impact on the process of abortion, people who have abortions, people who support those having abortions, people and institutions who provide abortion.
• Please consider inroads’ vision and goals when designing your project proposals. Strong proposals can articulate how this project moves towards one or more of these goals.
• Review outcomes from past inroads grantees, described in this report, or on the inroads website. (If you are a member who needs assistance with your log-in credentials, please email info@endabortionstigma.org)

Inroads will not fund projects that:

• Are vague and lacking in specific detail about how they address stigma directly
• Do not include clear or realistic project objectives
• Do not directly address stigma. Proposals for policy change, advocacy, decriminalization, community awareness, health systems, or other interventions that are not explicit about how they will address stigma will not be funded.
• Shame or marginalize individuals who have or provide abortions, groups, or abortion methods as a strategy. For example, shaming or marginalizing individuals who use so called “traditional” or herbal methods for abortion in an attempt to promote safe methods of abortion are not appropriate projects for this fund.
• Include only awareness-raising, sensitization, or values clarification activities without a clear articulation of how they will reduce stigma or will destigmatize abortion and do not have a clear follow-up strategy
• Illustrations or dramatizations of abortion stigma or the danger of abortion stigma alone will not be funded. As a network, we are interested in supporting projects that highlight what we can do to challenge, mitigate or dismantle stigma what we can do to challenge, mitigate or dismantle stigma.
• Are not realistic or feasible within time frame and budget.