Museum Grants for African American History and Culture (2025) | AAHC FY25

Opportunity Information: Apply for AAHC FY25

The Museum Grants for African American History and Culture (2025) opportunity is a discretionary federal grant program offered by the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) under CFDA 45.309. Its central purpose is to strengthen African American museums by building their organizational capacity and by supporting the professional growth of staff working in these institutions. In practical terms, the program is aimed at helping African American museums become more resilient, better resourced, and more effective in delivering their missions to the public, while also investing in the people who manage, preserve, interpret, and share African American history and culture through museum work.

The program supports projects that fall into three broad, closely related outcomes. First, it funds efforts that nurture museum professionals, which can include training, mentoring, skill-building, and other career development activities that improve professional practice in African American museums. Second, it supports work that builds institutional capacity, meaning projects that strengthen internal systems and operations such as planning, governance, collections care, policies and procedures, sustainability, and other foundational elements that help a museum function well over time. Third, it prioritizes increasing access to museum and archival collections, encouraging projects that make collections easier to discover, use, and engage with. This access focus applies to collections held at African American museums as well as collections at Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), reflecting a commitment to ensuring these materials are preserved and made available for learning, research, and public interpretation.

IMLS expects to make about 35 awards under this opportunity, with a maximum award amount (ceiling) of up to $500,000 per grant. While the specific eligibility rules are referenced in the official Notice of Funding Opportunity, the listed eligible applicant category is "Others," and the description makes clear that African American museums and HBCUs are central to the program’s intended audience and project scope. The funding instrument is a grant, and the activity category is Arts and Humanities, signaling that supported projects should align with museum work, cultural heritage stewardship, public history, interpretation, and related humanities-oriented activities.

Key dates included in the listing indicate the opportunity was created on August 15, 2024, and the original application deadline is November 15, 2024. Applicants considering this program should plan proposals around capacity-building, professional development, and collections access goals that are realistic, well-scoped, and clearly tied to strengthening African American museums and the stewardship and visibility of African American history and culture collections. For the final determination of applicant eligibility, required components, and any program-specific rules, the Notice of Funding Opportunity is the controlling document.

• The Institute of Museum and Library Services in the arts, humanities sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "Museum Grants for African American History and Culture (2025)" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 45.309.
• This funding opportunity was created on 2024-08-15.
• Applicants must submit their applications by 2024-11-15. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• Each selected applicant is eligible to receive up to $500,000.00 in funding.
• The number of recipients for this funding is limited to 35 candidate(s).
• Eligible applicants include: Others.

Apply for AAHC FY25

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