This grant will launch strategies including fellowships, a train-the-trainer curriculum, and workshops that strengthen Detroit students’ pathways to and from HBCUs. Kresge-funded research shows that HBCUs are popular among Detroiters, but high school guidance counselors have limited knowledge of this postsecondary option. It will be piloted with youth-serving organizations on Marygrove’s campus. View Website

This grant aims to advance family economic well-being in Tennessee by offering clear, Tennessee-focused information on budgets, policies, and how decisions are made affecting economic mobility, through community engagement sessions and at least one policy summit. It will update and expand dialogue with key health and human services programs, including researching the usage of state plans to best inform systems change . The project will also foster deeper engagement with policymakers, civic leaders, journalists, advocates, and communities during a pivotal election year and leadership transition. View Website

This grant will support the Reinvestment Fund’s HBCU Brilliance Fund to evaluate the work of its inaugural cohort, which integrates access to capital, technical assistance, and peer learning. Lessons from the first cohort will be applied as the program launches a second cohort, with a focus on engaging HBCUs in Kresge priority cities. Participating institutions will receive blended capital investments to support the development or implementation of high-priority, community anchor planning or institution projects. View Website

This grant will support the New School’s Institute on Race, Power and Political Economy to engage a Senior Fellow to assess opportunities to further deepen the integration of research within its Human Rights Economy framework with an initial focus on baby bonds, budget equity, color of wealth, color of achievement, and AI to inform public engagement and field building. This is a cross-team grant with the Detroit team. View Website

This supports Andrew Goodman's Vote Everywhere program, which seeks to strengthen civic education and leadership development efforts at Historically Black Colleges and Universities, with an eye toward helping HBCUs build long-term capacity for democratic participation and community engagement. View Website

This general operating support grant enables Smart Growth America to help create healthy, prosperous, and resilient places to live for all people through research, advocacy, and direct support to community-based organizations, practitioners, and government at the intersection of transportation, climate, creativity, and housing issues. This cross-team investment reflects the importance of integrated approaches to tackling these issues and helping combat climate change, improve health outcomes, and connect residents to economic opportunity while uniquely applying arts and cultural methodologies for community engagement, research, and capacity-building. View Website

This grant renews operating support to the School of Arts & Culture at Mexican Heritage Plaza, a community arts center, cultural convener, and creativity hub, to affirm identity, foster belonging and mobilize residents and businesses in the East San Jose community. View Website

This grant provides general operating support to Rockwood Leadership Institute to sustain its nationally recognized, equity-centered leadership development work for nonprofit and movement leaders. View Website

This grant provides general operating support to ProInspire to sustain leadership development and talent pathways for equity focused nonprofit and social impact leaders. View Website

This grant renews support for the People’s Solar Energy Fund, which pairs non-extractive financing with technical assistance and community organizing to scale community-led and community-serving solar energy projects. View Website

This grant supports the Initiative for Energy Justice, which provides frontline advocates—including in Kresge’s focus cities—as well as city and state policymakers with energy law and policy analysis and tools grounded in equity. Their ability to navigate within and between the worlds of law, policy, regulation, advocacy, and organizing lends them an invaluable role in helping to bring about a more equitable, just, and sustainable energy system. View Website

This grant provides general operating support to the National Student Legal Defense Network (Student Defense), a nonpartisan organization using litigation and policy advocacy to advance students’ rights to educational opportunities.  Student Defense has a strong record of representing borrowers against for-profit colleges, helping secure billions of dollars in loan discharges for half a million borrowers defrauded by these entities.  Renewed Kresge support will enable Student Defense to continue supporting policies aimed at creating a fairer and more effective system of protections and oversight to promote higher education equity, as well as support its new Safeguarding Higher-Ed Through AI Practices & Ethics (SHAPE AI) initiative. View Website

This grant recommendation will support the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS) as it embeds a Two-Generation (2Gen) framework into its new Mi Family Together family preservation model, recognizing the critical connection between child well-being and family economic stability. The investment will provide evidence, implementation support, and cross-sector partnerships to help operationalize an integrated service delivery approach that addresses the needs of both children and their caregivers. As MDHHS transitions toward institutionalizing these innovations through procurement, policy, and future state funding mechanisms, philanthropic support will serve as a strategic bridge that sustains momentum. View Website

The grant will support MDC’s “State of the Southern Family” initiative, a community-grounded research and policy effort designed to center families as experts across southern states, including Tennessee, Louisiana, and Mississippi, to surface structural misalignments in the social safety net and translate lived experience into actionable reforms that improve outcomes and reduce administrative burden. View Website

This grant provides project support to the Live6 Alliance to design, implement and manage initiatives that anchor Kresge’s investment strategy in the Livernois-McNichols district. This grant consolidates Kresge support for initiatives that will launch in 2026, including program costs and staffing capacity to implement the Resident Investment and Opportunity Fund, Neighborhood Association Operating Grants, land use pilots and planning, and commercial corridor sustainability and activation initiatives. View Website

This grant renews operating support to La Mujer Obrera to strengthen social cohesion and leverage culture and creativity as integral strategies in advancing environmental health, education, housing and anti-displacement in the Chamizal neighborhood in El Paso, TX. View Website

This general operating support grant will sustain core operations, expand community-centered programming and engagement, and build organizational capacity for the Joe Louis Greenway Partnership as the Greenway is fully developed into an equitable, regional public space. View Website

This grant provides general operating support to Interaction Institute for Social Change (IISC) to sustain its equity centered facilitation and systems change work for nonprofits and movement leaders. Additional funds have been recommended to support IISC’s leadership transition. View Website

Innovate Memphis’ data intermediary, Data Midsouth, will enhance its data dashboards for nonprofits, civic leaders, funders, researchers, and the general public, initiate convenings within sectors, and update its business model. View Website

This renewal grant supports ICLEI–Local Governments for Sustainability USA to advance its Communities Leading on Climate Mobility Initiative, strengthening local government capacity to plan for and respond to climate‑driven displacement in ways that advance resilience, equity, and shared prosperity. ICLEI will deepen and expand local pilot projects (including exploratory pilots in Detroit and New Orleans), broaden cohort‑based learning and peer exchange, and strengthen cross‑sector coordination. View Website