Irvine makes grants in three program areas: Arts, California Perspectives and Youth. Within each program, we have identified specific priorities for our grantmaking. Our staff consults with practitioners, researchers, policymakers and others to identify ways that we might help advance these priorities. We then identify and meet with a wide range of nonprofit organizations to learn about the most effective strategies being undertaken. When we find organizations whose work aligns with our program priorities, we invite a grant proposal. To learn more about the criteria we use to assess full proposals, click here.

As a result of this approach, the majority of our grantees are identified and contacted by our program staff or represent renewal commitments. While we also accept unsolicited inquiries from grantseekers, we are able to fund relatively few of them.

In our Arts program, we receive between 500 and 750 inquiries from grantseekers each year. Given the broad goals of this program, we are able to fund approximately 20 percent of unsolicited inquiries through the Creative Connections Fund, our open, competitive grants program for small and midsize arts organizations. Please click here to apply to the Creative Connections Fund.

We also receive approximately 750 additional inquiries each year about funding from our California Perspectives and Youth programs. While we accept unsolicited inquiries for these programs, we are able to directly fund less than one percent of them. Nearly all of our competitive grantmaking in these programs is done through intermediary organizations. Please click here to submit an inquiry for California Perspectives or Youth funding.

We respect the time and effort that goes into submitting a grant inquiry, and we respond to each inquiry with promptness and fairness.