Grants

Grant Recipient

Per Scholas, Inc.

Awarded: October 2023 Awarded Amount: $150,000

Per Scholas’s mission is to advance economic equity through rigorous training for tech careers, and to connect skilled talent to leading businesses. We prepare individuals historically excluded in tech—women, people of color, & those with at most a high school diploma—for high-growth careers in IT. We partner with employers to build diverse talent pools, connecting our graduates to career opportunities at businesses ranging from Fortune 500 companies to startups. Our training supports long-term career growth, & we aim for graduates to be employed in positions that offer competitive compensation and benefits packages, inclusive work environments, & work-life balance. Nationally, in 2022, our employed graduates represented $100 million in earned wages added to their local economies across the US. They accumulated savings, purchased cars and homes. When individuals earn a thriving wage, they can make active choices—investing in themselves, their families, and their communities. We respectfully request a $150,000 Bridges to Brighter Futures grant in support of our work to provide technology training to individuals from the City of Chicago and surrounding counties over a 12-month period, leading to middle-skills employment and thriving-wage careers in tech.

Grant Recipient

Chicago Women in Trades

Awarded: October 2023 Awarded Amount: $150,000

Chicago Women in Trades (CWIT) requests a Middle Skills Grant of $150,000 from the Bridges to Brighter Futures Fund to support advancing women in the construction trades. Founded in 1981 and a provider of pre-apprenticeship training since 1987, CWIT has placed thousands of women, particularly women of color, in the construction trades. Our most successful stories include women who first enter CWIT training either unemployed or earning wages at or below poverty level and, having graduated and earned a paid trade apprenticeship, move to $20/hour for their first year in apprenticeship toward $40 after four years in apprenticeship. Once journey level is reached in the trades, women earn $50/hour, providing economic security to their families. Our proven ability to secure placement and retention into these living wage jobs (defined by Bridges to Brighter Futures as $25/hour or above) for an average of 80% of CWIT pre-apprenticeship program and welding trainees, not to mention returning alumnae, is the strength of this proposed project. Chicago Women in Trades (CWIT) offers three different workforce development programs at no cost to participants. Two focus on bridging women to construction apprenticeship programs, including the 12-week/180-hour Technical Opportunities Program (offered during after-work evening hours since 1987) and the 10-week/280-hour Women Build Illinois Program (offered during daytime with stipends since 2022), both certified by North American Building Trades Unions (NABTU). The 10-week/280-hour Women in Welding Program (established in 2014), which includes daytime beginning classes and evening advanced skills open shops, builds skills in all welding processes (MIG, Stick, and TIG) and metal working processes (cutting, bending, and finishing), which leads to American Welding Society Certification that is in demand across many sectors of the economy. Our training provides the math and workplace readiness instruction, strength training, and the hands-on exposure needed to become an electrician, plumber, sprinkler fitter, bricklayer, laborer, pipefitter, sheet metal worker, painter, drywall finisher, millwright, and welder. Job placement and retention at a living wage that advances to building wealth is our goal. Efforts to reach this goal include but are not limited to: 1. Job Placement, Re-Placement, and Supportive Services – In CY2022, CWIT placed over 115 women pre-apprenticeship graduates and out-of-work tradeswomen. 2. Barrier Reduction – In addition to childcare, transportation, and equipment/tool support, women who enter unpaid pre-job apprenticeships with some unions (e.g., 9-week indentured carpenters) need the support of stipends. 3. Mentorship & Leadership Development – Finding support among fellow tradeswomen and learning skills to retain employment and advance is key. Workshops such as Stepping Up to Foreman, Public Speaking, and Conflict Resolution, led by successful peers provide confidence. 4. Additional Skills & Certifications – Tradeswomen are more marketable when they have skills such as Appraising, Estimating, Foreman, ProGrid/ProCore (software) E Board, Delegates, Union Reps, CDL, business development, etc. and certifications such as aerial lift, OSHA-30, CDL permit, welding inspector, flagger. 5. Incentive-based Programs that Encourage Contractors to Hire Women – Workforce development partnerships around major projects such as the Obama Presidential Center, Bally’s Casino, Clayco, etc. Funding from the Bridges to Brighter Futures Fund will be used to implement CWIT’s placement and retention plan that will allow CWIT to increase tradeswomen’s placement and retention success short-term to at least 150 in 2024 and, in the long-term, to an anticipated 200-250 in subsequent years. This increased capacity will be successful, as long as current economic conditions persist, by effectively replicating our nationally recognized model with expanded retention staff, additional student barrier reduction funds, and increased opportunities to attain certifications and leadership development.

Grant Recipient

This Old Farm

Awarded: October 2023 Awarded Amount: $100,000

This Old Farm, Inc (TOFI) is seeking funds to continue a network of small meat processors and industry stakeholders originally started in 2022. The network consists of several small to mid sized meat processors looking to expand collaboration through continuing education and networking with the goal of collectively developing strategies to increase local processing capacity while developing markets for co-packing of value-added meat products. Supporting processing business sustainability ultimately will reduce barriers to growth of small to medium-sized farmers and meat processors serving the Chicago foodshed.

Grant Recipient

NeighborSpace

Awarded: October 2023 Awarded Amount: $80,000

The project, a partnership between NeighborSpace (NBSP) and Chicago Food Policy Action Council (CFPAC), will provide support to implement actionable land access strategies for growing local food on underutilized land in Chicago and Cook County using a community-based framework rooted in values of equity, sustainability, and collaboration.

Grant Recipient

Basils Harvest

Awarded: October 2023 Awarded Amount: $50,000

Basil’s Harvest, BH, seeks a renewal grant to expand the RAH initiative in partnership with the National Guard by establishing a farm-to-institution value chain with the National Guard units in Illinois and Minnesota.

Grant Recipient

Grow Greater Englewood

Awarded: October 2023 Awarded Amount: $75,000

Support for the continuation of Englewood Village Farms. Looking at how to support and standardize land access issues, farm support issues and capital improvements and security for urban farms in Englewood

Grant Recipient

LATINOS PROGRESANDO

Awarded: October 2023 Awarded Amount: $35,000

Grant Recipient

Fresh Taste

Awarded: October 2023 Awarded Amount: $270,000

This application is a request for $270,000 ($135,000 for each of two years) to support the Illinois Regenerative Agriculture Initiative (IRAI), a collaborative project to grow the sustained research, education, and outreach effort in regenerative agriculture at the University of Illinois, with goals of facilitating foundational knowledge and experience needed to position UIUC for regenerative agriculture leadership; reducing fragmentation in Illinois regenerative agriculture by creating shared understanding, language, vision, and content (teaching and outreach materials); and leveraging resources and grants to normalize regenerative agriculture within UIUC, Illinois, and the Midwest. [NOTE: The UIUC team will announce a name shift for the project work at the University later this year. For the purposes of this application, we continue to use “IRAI.” However, the attached document refers to new name, I-Regen.]