Connecting Youth to the Outdoors Grant Program

Posted by on August 13, 2012

National Environmental Education Foundation Announces America’s Great Outdoors: Connecting Youth to the Outdoors Grant Program
Deadline: September 19, 2012

The National Environmental Education Foundation, in partnership with the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, United States Forest Service, and the Bureau of Land Management, have launched the America’s Great Outdoors: Connecting Youth to the Outdoors 2012 Grants program.

Through the new program, NEEF and its partners seek to catalyze efforts to increase the number of pre-K-12 youth, particularly urban and/or underserved youth, who build a connection with public lands as places for recreating, learning and volunteering. Proposed projects should maximize hands-on outdoor engagement opportunities on public lands, focused on the areas of 1) education — opportunities that provide quantifiable and meaningful conservation education outcomes that enhance environmental literacy, support STEM education, and use of the environment as a context for learning; 2) recreation —opportunities that promote healthy lifestyles, build outdoor recreation skills, and engage youth in active recreation such as hiking, paddling, snowshoeing, hunting and fishing, wildlife watching, and geo-caching; and 3) environmental stewardship — opportunities that provide quantifiable and meaningful conservation outcomes such as native fish-focused stream restoration, species- focused landscape restoration, invasive species removal, native plant restoration, wildlife surveys/assessments, project monitoring,and trail restoration.

To be eligible, applicants must be a Forest Service or Bureau of Land Management unit or a nonprofit organization, academic institution, or tribal group that partners with these agencies. Applicants must have been in existence for at least two years. The proposed youth engagement events must be held on a Forest Service or BLM site, or show that the project clearly benefits these agencies.
Approximately $243,000 in funding is available to support awards in the range of $2,500 to $20,000. There is a minimum one-to-one non-federal match required for this grant, though larger match ratios are encouraged.

The complete Request for Proposals and the online application system are available at the NEEF Web site.

http://www.neefusa.org/grants/connecting_youth