Grant Guidelines

(Revised April 2008)

The Dana Foundation, established in 1950 by the industrialist, philanthropist, and legislator Charles A. Dana, is a private philanthropic foundation with principal interests in science, health, and education. The Foundation’s current areas of research emphasis are in neuroscience, immunology, and the effects of arts training on cognitive skills. Selected proposals have the potential to improve human health or functioning. Grants also support improvement in K-12 education, particularly in training professional artists to teach in the public schools. Specific grantmaking programs in these areas are the basis for decisions on grant applications. No applications are considered apart from these grant programs.

GENERAL POLICIES

The Foundation:

1. Supports programs in science, health, and education through specifically defined objectives in each field.
2. Requires grantee institutions, in many cases, to share the cost of a project or raise matching funds.
3. Makes no grants directly to individuals.
4. Does not support annual operating costs of organizations, deficit reduction, capital campaigns, or individual sabbaticals.
5. Does not schedule meetings with applicants, other than by specific invitation initiated by the Foundation. 

APPLICATION GUIDELINES

Science and Health Grants

Through competitive applications, Dana supports research in neuroscience, neuroimmunology, and training in clinical immunology.

Brain and Immuno-imaging. Investigators use conventional or cellular and molecular imaging techniques to pilot-test novel clinical hypotheses on the brain or interactions between brain and immune cells. Requests for Proposals (RFPs) are sent twice yearly to deans of U.S. Medical Schools and other invited biomedical research institutions.

Human Immunology. The Dana Foundation will support promising new investigators who are beginning careers in patient-based immunology research. Dana Scholar awards will be provided to selected candidates who are early career assistant professors (with one or no current RO1 awards) in U.S. academic institutions or post-doctoral fellows who will have a confirmed U.S. faculty appointment at the time the award is made. Applications are accepted once a year. Scholars should be initiating or engaged in research in immunology that requires the study of patients or materials from patients.

Neuroimmunology. The Neuroimmunology Program has been redesigned to focus on brain infections and cancers. Specifically, we are inviting studies of 1) immune-based therapies for primary brain tumors, and for metastases to the brain of other cancers; 2) immune responses to infections in the brain, including but not limited to viral encephalitis, meningitis, cerebral malaria, and prion diseases, and 3) how the immune system affects the brain and how the brain modifies immune function. RFPs are sent yearly U.S. Medical Schools and other invited biomedical research institutions.

Clinical Neuro­science Research. By invitation, translational researchers apply for support to test promising therapies from animal model research in a small number of patients with devastating, currently untreatable, brain diseases. Also supported are studies to develop ethical guidelines for clinical brain research, and prognostic data based on treatment outcomes in patients with severe brain injuries or disorders.

All other Science and Health Grants are made solely by invitation. For information on Science and Health grants, please contact:

Arts Education Grants

The Foundation's current interest in arts education is focused on professional development that fosters improved teaching of the performing arts in public schools. Proposed projects must emphasize innovative training curricula for artists and in-school arts specialists.  These projects must originate in New York City, Wash¬ington, DC, or Los Angeles, or within a 50 mile radius, or they must serve rural areas of the United States. Information and guidelines about the general and rural grants are available online, as are the forms for applying. 
For information on Arts Education grants, please contact:

Education Grants

The Foundation has supported advances in education throughout its history. The Foundation's continuing interest in fostering innovations in K-12 education is maintained through grant support for the Dana Center for Education Innovation at the University of Texas in Austin. Other Foundation support for select education projects is internally generated or invited.

While the education grants program is designed to benefit schools and school systems throughout the country, Foundation grants ordinarily are not made directly to individual schools.

For information on Education grants, please contact:

Grants Office, The Dana Foundation
745 Fifth Avenue, Suite 900
New York, New York 10151
(212) 223-4040