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We are a group of individuals who collectively give $1,000 no-strings-attached grants for projects in the Santa Cruz County area that are brave, creative and inspiring. We especially love art-based projects that inspire kindness and compassion within our community.

If you'd like to make a donation to our chapter to help us fund our projects, please send us an email at santacruz@awesomefoundation.org Note that donations (including monthly contributions made by our trustees) are NOT tax deductible.

If you want to apply for a grant from our chapter, please read the following summary of what we look for in an AWESOME proposal:

• Does your project bring people together? Physically or virtually or both? How?

• What portion of the Santa Cruz County community will your project impact? How? When? This is a key piece of our consideration, so please be specific!

• Identify any individuals or organizations in Santa Cruz County with whom you might be partnering. Again, be specific.

• How does your project inspire kindness and compassion?

• Does your project have staying power after the grant money is gone?

• Is your project a stepping stone that will launch into something bigger?

• Include cost details showing that your project (or a specific key component of your project) can be fully funded with $1000.

• Identify the venue for your project along with any associated costs, e.g. rent, liability insurance, etc.

• Our grants are funded only through Paypal. Please indicate on your application what Paypal account you wish to receive the funds.

We generally fund one project every month, but we reserve the right not to award a grant in any month during which we don't receive a proposal that meets our standards. We don't fund requests for projects that are not local to Santa Cruz County. We also don't fund requests for personal expenses (e.g. rent) or business operations (e.g. admin or startup costs).

We prioritize supporting creative endeavors of individuals and small groups. We will consider only projects that can be either principally funded or a component of a larger project can be fully funded with the $1,000 grant.

We want to be a part of your awesomeness, so we ask all of our winners to keep us informed of each project's progress, with photos and updates we can include on our website and social media.

If we choose your awesome project, we take you at your word that 1) your project will be finished within a reasonable amount of time, 2) your project will not violate any applicable law, and 3) you will acknowledge whenever possible the support you received from the Awesome Foundation Santa Cruz Chapter.

Except for the part about not violating any applicable laws, these aren't strict rules, just guidelines. We might just throw away everything we mentioned earlier for any project that makes us stop in our tracks and say “Whoa! That's awesome!”

Proposals are due the last day of every month. We typically meet during the second week of the month to discuss grants received in the previous month and award a winner. The winner will be announced shortly after that. If your project needs to meet a timeline, please apply as early as possible.