Mentoring Grants for Nonprofits

Mentorship can have a significant impact, especially for our youth. For example, mentored youths are significantly more likely to enroll in college or become volunteers. Mentorship helps improve confidence, academic outcomes and career savviness. This is why many nonprofits include mentorship as part of their programming. In fact, many nonprofits themselves can benefit from mentorship from other nonprofit experts!

All this mentorship is supported by the generous funding provided by mentorship grants. These grants can help cover the time, recruitment and training of mentors across all fields and specializations. There are many different entities that provide these kinds of mentoring grants. Traditionally, this included federal organizations such as the National Mentoring Resource Center. There are also many private and community foundations involved in this space, such as the Grable Foundation or the Ford Family Foundation. 

When drafting a mentorship grant proposal, you need to mix evocative storytelling about individuals who benefited from mentorship along with hard data on the topic. This can include information on the educational attainment or career outcomes of those whom your nonprofit has provided mentoring to. You need to demonstrate a clear need, and the fact that your nonprofit is poised to meet that need. 

If you need further tips and guidance on writing great grant proposals, you can take a look at our comprehensive overview of the topic. You can also browse a wide selection of Mentoring grants right here, all open for applications.