Do You Have a Bold Idea to Improve the School Food System?
Apply to join our second cohort of Project SCALES grantees.
Applications are due
on December 13, 2024
- Grants are available from $500,000 to $1,000,000
- We anticipate awarding up to $8.5 million total
- Funding for up to 3 years (July 2025 to June 2028)
Objectives of Project SCALES
Applicants should propose innovative and collaborative approaches that reimagine the school food system and that could be sustained and scaled elsewhere. We encourage applicants to think creatively about transformational partnerships and projects, particularly those that bring new industry into the school food supply chain.
We invite applicants to submit a proposal for grant funding to support projects that show clear potential for achieving one or more of these goals:
- improving the K-12 school food supply chain by incentivizing innovation and building partnerships between various entities of the food system, including manufacturers or producers;
- reducing barriers for schools related to sourcing, ordering, processing, and/or storing locally-sourced foods and beverages;
- supporting school nutrition teams in using fresh local ingredients, being responsive to student preferences and cultural relevance, and increasing scratch cooking;
- leveraging social responsibility of food industry to address innovative solutions for the school food system; and
- identifying sustainable solutions and best practices for the K-12 food system that are scalable and replicable.
Team Eligibility
Projects must be collaboratively administered by at least three partners, with one lead partner and at least two partner organizations. All partners should be involved in implementing the project. Teams must include at least one school food authority, and at least one partner from industry. Potential partners include:
- School food authorities that operate the National School Lunch Program (required)
- Food industry (required):
- Food manufacturers or producers
- Food processors
- Food aggregators (e.g., food hubs)
- Food distributors
- Growers and producers (e.g., farms, orchards, ranches, fisheries)
- Food support organizations, including food systems–focused nonprofits
- Public sector agency (e.g., local, county, or state government agency or department)
- Indian Tribal Organizations
- Community-based organizations
- Small businesses
- Other food system partners
Application Resources
Before submitting an application, please download and read the entire Request for Applications for important details.
These additional resources are provided to assist with applications:
- Budget Instructions: PDF
- Budget Template: XLS
- Application Questions: Word
- Criteria for Reviewing Applications: PDF
This recorded webinar has more information about Project SCALES, including guidance on how to prepare and submit an application.
Do you have questions or need help with your application? Email us at [email protected] or send us an inquiry here. We would be happy to answer specific questions or to schedule a Zoom meeting.
Apply Here!
When you are ready to submit your application, use the link above to proceed to the secure external application portal. The portal will require you to register for a password-protected account before submitting an application. By using the portal, you are indicating that you are aware of and accept the terms and conditions of WizeHive and the Zengine platform.