Round Three Grant Application
We are pleased to invite submissions from qualified organizations and partnerships for our third round of systems change grants. The deadline for submission is 11:59pm PDT on March 31st, 2020 via our online application portal.
Below is a summary of our process and guidelines. Before submitting a proposal, please review our full guidelines, which include additional information on what we fund, our approach to systems change, and our approach to gender equity and women’s leadership. You may also find it helpful to review our scoring criteria.
We will be holding four public Question & Answer sessions throughout the submission period. Join us by signing up here.
To receive e-mail updates on the Round 3 process, please sign up for our R3 mailing list.
Overview
Co-Impact supports a small number of transformative systems change initiatives, each of which is poised to bring about significant and enduring improvements for millions of women, men and children in the Global South. We provide flexible grants, typically of US $10-25 million over 5 years, for systems change initiatives in the areas of health, education, and economic opportunity, and that address gender equity and inclusion in meaningful ways.
For this third round of grants, we are seeking to support initiatives that:
Focus on improving the lives of one million people or more
Have a clearly articulated approach to changing systems at scale
Are led by organizations in the Global South/based in countries in which they seek to make a difference.
Address gender equity and inclusion. We particularly welcome initiatives led by women (we will ensure that at least 50% of the initiatives we support are led by women)
Have a strong track record of results
Use evidence-informed pathways to achieve specific outcomes in health, education, and/or economic opportunity.
Process
We expect to use the following timeline and process for our third round of grants:
Jan 2020
Dec 2020
Sourcing & initial consideration: (January – December 2020, with design grant decision expected in January 2021). 1) Sourcing and initial consideration of all submitted concept notes; 2) further information requests and calls in approximately June and July 2020 with about 20-30 initiatives; and 3) detailed engagement with up to 10 initiatives, likely including site visits in roughly September – October 2020.
Feb 2021
Sep 2021
Design Grants: (February 2021 – September 2021). We expect to provide 5-8 of the most promising organizations and partnerships with “design” grants of up to US $500,000 each to advance and pressure-test their systems change initiative, and to develop a robust strategy and proposal. The outcome of this process is meant to be valuable in itself by enabling organizations to further their thinking and work, strengthen their partnerships and support their broader efforts to raise funds (not just from Co-Impact). The typical design grant period is 6-8 months.
Dec 2021
Dec 2026
Systems change grants: (estimated decision December 2021). Co-Impact expects to award 3-5 systems change grants, which are typically between US $10-25 million each over 5 years, to a subset of the design grant organizations/ partnerships. We also provide support for learning, adaptation, and organizational strengthening. Each award is intended to provide substantial support, but will typically only represent 25-35% (and not more than 50%) of the total funding needs of a given systems change initiative.
Qualifications
Please ensure that you fulfill the following criteria before writing a concept note. We regret that we cannot consider organizations or partnerships that do not meet these criteria.
1. Outcomes: Enable enduring change in health, education, and economic system(s) that significantly improve the lives one million or more disadvantaged women and men in one or more low or middle-income countries in the Global South within 5 years, related to one or more of the following people-level outcomes:
- Economic Opportunity, through significant increases in:
- Quality (safe, stable, fairly compensated) income-earning opportunities/jobs
- People entering and remaining in quality income-earning opportunities/jobs
- Net earnings realized from income-earning activities, and/or household assets
- Value of household assets that demonstrably increase the household’s resilience and/or income-earning potentials
- Health, through significant improvements in:
- Mortality
- Morbidity
- DALYs (disability-adjusted life years)
- Reduced rates of stunting and wasting of young children
- Education, through significant increases in:
- Improved rates of children who are “school-ready” when starting primary school
- Basic literacy and numeracy in primary grades and/or adult literacy
- Completion of secondary education, particularly for girls
- Attainment of measurable, critical “deeper learning” skills (e.g., ability to analyze, reason, think critically, problem-solve)
2. Scale of Impact: Proposed initiative has a high potential for large-scale change and is poised to:
a. Improve one million lives or more in 5 years, in at least one of our target outcomes; and
b. Enable “adoption at scale” of a proven model (see Annex 2 in full application guidelines)
In exceptional circumstances, we will consider initiatives which may be able to improve close to but not fully one million lives in 5 years where they can demonstrate a credible and compelling path towards systemic change at scale.
3. Global South Rootedness: The anchor partner/lead organization is led by and rooted in the Global South, meeting at least 2 out of the 3 of the following criteria:
- Global Head Office and majority of total staff presence are in a Global South country (with a strong preference for them to be in the country(ies) that the initiative is targeting).
- The anchor organization or initiative leader and at least 50% of the senior leadership are from a Global South country (with a strong preference for leaders from and/or a national of the country(ies) the initiative is targeting).
- The anchor organization/initiative has long-term roots in the region, as demonstrated by 10+ years of working on strengthening systems in the target country or region, and can demonstrate long-term and substantial working partnerships with local actors and commitment to investing in local talent for leadership positions.
4. Gender: Proposed initiative has a proactive and strategic approach to addressing discrimination against women and girls to exercise voice and participation, set agendas and make decisions. This commitment needs to be embedded within their programmatic work, own organization, and analysis of the problem as well as design for systemic change. For further details please see full application guidelines, particularly p.5 and Annex 3.
- a. All selected initiatives demonstrate a proactive approach to addressing gender equity and inclusion in the analysis of the problem, the design and model of systems change, definition of the outcomes they seek to achieve and metrics for success, and in promoting women’s leadership at all levels of the initiative and their own organization(s).
- b. At least 50% of the initiatives that we will select are substantively led by women. We define “substantive women leadership” as when the primary leader and a significant portion of the senior leadership of the anchor organization or initiative are women. In addition, the gender composition of the anchor organization’s Board is also a factor that influences our selection.
5. Countries: Proposed initiative is focused on one or more low- and middle-income countries in the Global South. We do not support work in high-income countries. Initiatives need to explain how the country(ies) in which they seek to work have at least minimal civic and governance conditions that are necessary to undertake – and sustain – a meaningful systems change effort. We do not have a pre-selected list of countries that qualify, but we expect you to provide compelling explanation as to why your work will succeed if you if you propose to work in countries where civic and governance conditions are obviously challenged.
6. Evidence: Independent, third-party evaluation shows that the core approach/model/idea(s) at the center of the initiative works and achieves the intended people-centered outcomes. While this evaluation needs to be relevant, rigorous and of high quality, we do not require the use of any particular methodology.
In exceptional circumstances, we will consider initiatives which may not have rigorous third-party evaluations where they can provide credible alternate evidence.
7. Scale: The proposed or very similar systems change initiative is already well underway (not a start-up or initial pilot), and in the past year has benefited at least 10,000 persons in a significant way.
8. Organisation(s):
- Initiatives has significant capacity and track record to work at scale; the annual budget in the last audited financial report of the Lead Organization is at least US $1 million or equivalent.
- Partnerships between multiple organizations are encouraged but not required; partnerships should designate a lead organization, which must meet the criteria stated in No. 3 above.
- Organization/partnership is not a political campaign promoting a specific candidate or party. While policy interventions may be a part of an initiative, lobbying organizations primarily seeking to change legislation are not eligible.
- For-profit organizations are eligible provided the primary objective of the effort is to achieve lasting social impact for millions of people in the domains described above.
Guidelines for Concept Note
Please review and respond to the guidelines below by downloading and filling in this MS Word template and submitting it in our application portal
1. Summary
- Summarize your core initiative and why you think it should be supported.
2. Overview of the problem
- Provide an overview of the nature of the problem, the impact of the problem on people’s lives, it’s gender dimensions, and who is most affected.
- What are the factors that permit the problem to persist (e.g. cultural, political, technical)?
- Which systems are impacted by, contribute to, and/or perpetuate the problem?
- Summarize prior and current efforts to address the problem, and why they have not been adequate.
3. Systems change initiative
- What is the specific system you will seek to shift or improve?
- How will your intervention improve that system? What “fulcrum(s)” or “lever(s)” have you identified where effort can have outsized impact?
- What gives you confidence that your approach is the right one? Why do you think this approach will succeed when previous efforts may have faltered?
4. Results
- What people-level outcomes do you aim to realize through your initiative? Select up to 3 outcomes specified above and elaborate/refine as appropriate. Who will benefit and what specific improvements in people’s lives will you achieve in 5 years?
- What are the systems-level measures you will use to track systemic change? How you will know that the system has improved? What would success look like?
- How will these changes be sustained after 5 years? What gives you confidence the improvements in people’s lives will persist over time?
5. Approach
- What partnerships/relationships/engagement with others will be critical to achieving these outcomes, and why? What partnerships are already in place, and which ones will need to be developed?
- How do you think about political economy and governance in your work, and how will you address these? In your judgement, do the countries where you plan to work exhibit the necessary civic and governance conditions to undertake – and sustain – a meaningful systems change effort?
- How will you address gender meaningfully in your work, intervention design, outcomes measurement and leadership at all levels? Is inclusion of other disadvantaged groups also a significant part of your work? If so, how?
- What is your approach to learning in this initiative? How do you plan to track progress? How do you intend to learn from and adapt your work?
6. Track Record
- What results have your efforts achieved to-date in relation to this initiative? Describe your team’s previous efforts or relevant experience that demonstrates your ability to deliver outcomes.
- What is your team’s history in the geographic area where you are proposing to work?
- Please provide a very brief summary of third-party evidence of the effectiveness of your core idea/ approach in a comparable context. Please also submit a copy of the third-party evidence with an Executive Summary including results, in English.
7. Budget
- What is your rough estimate of the 5-year cost for the initiative, in USD? How much of this is expected to be covered by existing resources, and how much new resources will be needed? At a high level, briefly explain the key cost drivers of your initiative and how the Co-Impact grant funding would be spent.
- Are there any committed or high-potential funders for this initiative? How much of existing expenditures (e.g. government resources) will you leverage?
8. Team
- How is your team positioned to deliver results? Why do you believe you have the right capabilities, experience, and commitment to execute? How representative is your team’s composition of the people you seek to benefit from the initiative?
- If your team consists of two or more organizations, why it is important to collaborate? What can your organizations accomplish together that they couldn’t accomplish alone? Why do you believe this will be an effective collaboration? Have the partners successfully worked together in the past?
- Will this proposed plan stretch your organization and challenge it to grow over the next 5 years? What new capabilities or skills might you need to develop? What organization-level outcomes will you seek to strengthen and track?
- Please include short (100-word max) biographies of the Initiative leader and 2-3 key staff.
A reminder that all submissions must include the following three components:
- A completed concept note (see guidelines)
- An independent, third-party evaluation including an executive summary (see guidelines)
- Responses to a general set of questions about your organization and initiative (see our online portal)
If you encounter trouble submitting your proposal via our online portal, you may e-mail your proposal with the above three components to round3@co-impact.org.
