Arts Access Catalyst Grant

Arts Access Catalyst Grant

Status: ACTIVE
Funder: The Miami Foundation
Amount: Up to US $20,000
Last Updated: July 29, 2025

Summary

The Arts Access Catalyst Grant, offered by The Miami Foundation, aims to enhance arts education for youth in Miami-Dade County. Grants of up to $20,000 over two years will support nonprofit organizations that partner with Miami-Dade County Public Schools. The program prioritizes initiatives that improve access to arts education, promote equity, and foster collaboration. Organizations are encouraged to use data from artlook Miami to inform their projects, ensuring they address real community needs and strengthen arts partnerships.

Overview

NOTE: While not required, we highly encourage organizations with existing or potential partnerships with an M-DCPS school to apply. If your organization is interested in applying, but does not have an existing partnership, we encourage you to schedule an office hours conversation with us. Arts Access Miami aims to bring the transformational power of arts and music education to all youth. With the launch of this re-envisioned grant program, we will offer nimble capacity building and programmatic grants that help close arts education gaps as highlighted from data in artlook® Miami and help foster stronger arts partnerships within the Miami-Dade County Public Schools ecosystem.Strengthening a network of leaders working toward the common goal of music access for all youth in Miami-Dade. Catalyst Grants are multi-year grants (up to $20,000 distributed over two years) for arts education programs, initiatives, and organizations in Miami-Dade. Grant funds are intended to address opportunities for strengthened arts partnerships between nonprofit organizations and Miami-Dade County Public Schools. In addition to the grant funds, The Miami Foundation will work closely with each selected grant partner throughout the grant period to provide guidance, additional resources, and facilitate further opportunities for collaboration and learning. Funding Priorities In addition to our eligibility requirements, we will prioritize funding organizations that: Focus on access to arts education We will support projects that not only engage youth in the arts, but also demonstrate a clear strategy to increase their access to these opportunities. Advance Equity We will prioritize organizations working with communities that face marginalization based on race, ethnicity, gender identity, sexual orientation, mixed-abilities, or other lines of difference. Collaborate We will prioritize organizations that can link their programmatic success to collaboration with a community, school, or partner organization. Use data as a guide We will prioritize projects that are guided and informed by data directly from artlook Miami. Are grassroots organizations We will prioritize organizations with budgets under $750,000 annually and that may lack the resources to navigate the complexities of school partnerships effectively. Focus Areas We want to prioritize real-time needs in arts access that have been identified through our artlook Miami data. For this grant cycle, we will prioritize organizations focused on: Artist residencies and professional development: Our artlook data reveals that there is a need for more partnerships that provide artist residencies and arts education-centered professional development for teachers. Dance & Theatre: While there is more access to visual arts and music, there is less access to dance and theatre. School Needs: artlook® Miami works with schools to collect data about needs for arts education partnerships and programs.  We will welcome applications that reference a discovery from the artlook Miami data that is not highlighted above that has informed their proposed programming. Note: While organizations may not have the time to analyze the artlook data, we encourage applicants to focus on how their project addresses a clear need within M-DCPS. If you would like guidance on how to align your proposal to identified needs in a meaningful way, please attend one of our upcoming webinars. Grant size and duration, requirements, and use: Grant Amounts: $20,000 distributed over a two-year cycle To ensure ongoing alignment and optimal use of funds, The Miami Foundation will review each grantees’ progress and address any areas of potential improvement prior to confirming the continuation of funding for the second year. Funding Note: We understand that creating, building, and launching an arts education program requires the appropriate resources. To that end, this grant is not intended to build a full-scale program, but rather as general operating support to seed a component of, scale an existing program, fund an initiative within, or to foster a new relationship with a school or partner. Our hope is that this funding will help our grant partners foster sustainable relationships that increase access to arts education.

Eligibility

You can learn more about this opportunity by visiting the funder's website. To be eligible for a Catalyst Grant, you must: Be a IRS 501©(3) public charity serving Miami-Dade County young people through the arts (Note: IRS 501(c)(3) public charity fiscal sponsors are also eligible to apply) Have a clear idea for how this grant will catalyze your work further within M-DCPS Orient toward collaborations and partnerships: While funds will be directed to individual organizations, our goal is to fund organizations that collaborate and partner with others. Have a 2024 operating budget of under $750,000 Intend to use the funding for an arts education program in partnership with an M-DCPS school. Have a record of consistent, ongoing participation opportunities for youth through the arts Have a focus on equity, with staff and board being representative of the communities served.