Updates

Since April 2018, more than $25 million in grants have been awarded to social justice organizations as part of the NFL's Inspire Change initiative. This includes more than 500 grants awarded to current and former NFL players for nonprofits across the country. These grants support programs and initiatives that reduce barriers to opportunity, with a focus on three priority areas:

• Education and economic advancement
• Police and community relations; and
• Criminal Justice Reform

As part of the NFL's 100th season Inspire Change efforts, the league is adding six new social justice grants and two grant renewals recently approved by the joint NFL players-owners working group. These new grants and renewals total nearly $3 million and are in addition to the grants previously announced in January 2019 and June 2019. The league is also introducing new Inspire Change videos to raise awareness about social justice.

New Social Justice Grants

Grantees receiving social justice funding in this round range from organizations providing educational support to those advocating to end mass incarceration. Following are the six new social justice grantees (bringing the total number of national social justice grantees to 18):

• Alabama Appleseed will use the funding for its Fair Schools, Safe Communities campaign, which combines research with policy advocacy, public education, coalition building, litigation, legislative action, and pro bono support to shift Alabama's historic reliance on incarceration to an evidence-based holistic approach focusing on treatment alternatives to incarceration, community programs, re-entry supports, and stopping drivers of poverty and incarceration.
• City Year will use the funding to augment its Whole School Whole Child student support program that unites 3000 young adults of all backgrounds to serve in schools as student success coaches.
• Community Justice Exchange will use the funding for its National Bail Fund Network project, which currently supports over 75 community-based bail and bond funds working to end money bail and pretrial detention at the local level.
• The Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change will use the funding to support its Nonviolence365® campaign which focuses on decreasing the prison population, reducing prison sentences, altering drug sentencing policy, policing reform, reducing overcriminalization, and juvenile justice reform. Funding will also support the organization's Students with King program designed for Pre-K-12 curriculum to inspire students to commit to nonviolence as a lifestyle through lessons on self-esteem, diversity, critical thinking and reflection.
• Metropolitan Family Services will use the funding for its Support Rapid Reduction Program which provides incentives for participants to make nonviolent choices. The organization will also use the funds to help support the Metropolitan Peace Academy, a training center that provides evidence and experience-based standards of practice for professional street outreach.
• The National Urban League will use the funding to support three programs focused on workforce development for young people, including court-involved youth – the Urban Apprenticeship Jobs Program, the Urban Youth Empowerment Program, and the Urban Re-Entry Jobs Program.

Social Justice Grant Renewals

Two previously funded organizations have also had their social justice grants renewed in this funding round:

• Dream Corps will continue to use the funding provided to support its #cut50 and #YesWeCode programs.
• United Negro College Fund will continue to use the funding provided to support programs focused on policy reform and social justice incubators.

​Learn more about Inspire Change and join the conversation using the hashtag #InspireChange.