Rapid Response: Reinvesting in Racial and Indigenous Health Equity Research

While we will not re-scrutinize the research design and approach, we are interested in funding projects that align with the spirit and values of E4A. Applicants should be involved in and exhibit a track record of conducting community-centered, action-oriented research focused on structural solutions to advance racial and/or Indigenous health equity.

Amidst federal attacks on racial and Indigenous equity and health equity research, RWJF has reaffirmed their long-term focus on dismantling structural racism. And racial and Indigenous health equity research - guided by community knowledge, power, and leadership - serves as a transformational catalyst for achieving this goal. It helps identify what works, for whom, and under what conditions to guide policies, implementation, and funding decisions that create meaningful impact to improve health and wellbeing. A healthier nation, where all Americans can thrive and grow, benefits everyone, and should serve as a unifying goal, transcending ideological divides. 

We must continue to invest in health equity research, to ensure that health is a right for all, rather than a privilege for a few.

Up to five million dollars will be awarded through this Call for Proposals. Individual grants may range between $50,000 to $200,000, inclusive of all budget periods and indirect costs. Applicants may only request the amount of funding that was guaranteed and remained unspent at the time the federally funded grant was interrupted. For example, if only $150,000 was unspent when the grant was terminated, that is the maximum amount that may be requested through this funding opportunity.

Consistent with our rule allowing only one application per impacted federal award, applicants may not request additional funding for a grant that was awarded through the prior round of rapid response research funding. However, we know that some people and organizations have lost multiple sources of funding, and previous rapid response research grantees may submit applications for separate research projects through this CFP.

No. Late submissions will not be accepted and extensions will not be granted to individual applicants for any reason. The application system is set to automatically stop accepting submissions on Wednesday, October 1, 2025 at 3:00pm EDT. We are unable to override the system or accept applications outside the system. We strongly encourage all applicants to submit their completed applications well ahead of the official deadline in case of technical difficulties or other issues impacting ability to submit. If you experience technical difficulties, please reach out to the program office for assistance right away (evidenceforaction@ucsf.edu); applicants expressing technical difficulties after the deadline cannot be assisted.

Webinar: There will be an optional webinar on Wednesday, August 27th (register here) where E4A and RWJF leadership will provide an overview of the funding opportunity, share additional insights and nuance, and answer participant questions. 

Virtual Office Hours: E4A staff will host twice-weekly drop-in office hours on Zoom, where you can ask high-level questions about the funding opportunity. Join a virtual conversation with our program staff.

Inquiries: If you have any other questions, please contact us at evidenceforaction@ucsf.edu.

http://www.rwjf.org/en/grants/funding-opportunities.html

All applicant materials must be submitted in the RWJF Application & Review (A&R) system by 3:00pm EDT on October 1, 2025. If you have not already done so, you will be required to register at my.rwjf.org before you begin the proposal process. All applicants should log in to the system and familiarize themselves with online application requirements.

Applications must be submitted before 3pm EDT, as the A&R system will stop accepting submission at 3pm. All application sections must show a status of “Finished,” and you must click the “Submit” button for your application to be considered successfully submitted. Please DO NOT wait until the last moment to submit. Late submissions will NOT be accepted. Do NOT email application materials to E4A; only materials submitted through the A&R system will be reviewed.

The A&R System is protected by a firewall that can make it difficult, if not impossible, to access applications from outside the US. If you are planning to travel outside of the country near the application deadline, please submit prior to your trip or make arrangements for someone within the US to submit the application on your behalf by adding them as a collaborator and granting them submission permission in the system.

Additional things you can try include:

• Clearing your cache;
• Clearing your browser history;
• Connecting to a different WiFi or internet source; and/or
• Using a different browser.

Any organization based in what is now known as the United States or its occupied territories is eligible for funding. Submissions from teams that include both U.S. and international members are eligible, but the lead applicant organization must be based in the United States or its territories. Additionally, research must be relevant to US-based populations.

Funding is exclusively available to applicants whose federally funded racial or Indigenous health equity research has been interrupted due to federal funding shifts. 

Organizations based in the US or its occupied territories are eligible to apply. The research project must also focus on improving health equity for populations residing within the US. 

Project directors who are currently receiving less than 50% of their salary from an active RWJF grant are eligible to apply.

While people of all personal and professional backgrounds are eligible to apply, we will prioritize funding for early- to mid-career anticolonial or antiracist scholars. For the purposes of this call, early to mid-career researchers are considered to be anyone who received their most recent degree within the last 15 years (2010 or later).

We especially encourage Project Director(s) having backgrounds and life experiences that are underrepresented on research teams, including Indigenous, Black, Latino, and other persons of color to apply.

Read a related blog to learn more about our thinking around project directors. 

For the purposes of this funding opportunity, applicants are considered to be early-to-mid-career if they received their most recent degree within the last fifteen years (2010 or later). The most recent degree does not have to be the most advanced degree received. If the PD is not early-to-mid-career, applicants can provide a justification within the Project Information Question section of the application as to why that PD has been selected to lead the project.

Any team member from the original project may be designated as the Project Director (PD). You do not need to have been the original PD on the grant to apply for this funding; it is sufficient to have been a member of the original research team or subawardee. The PD does not need to hold an advanced degree nor are there other educational or professional stipulations. However, the PD is responsible for ensuring the expectations and deliverables of the award are met, and should have the appropriate expertise and qualifications to lead the research project. Two PDs may be listed in the funding application, but the team is not limited to these two individuals. For ease of administration, it is preferable, but not required, for the PD to be based at the lead applicant organization.

• Applicants who have not received funding from a federal funding source (e.g., have not received a notice of award), including those who have been notified that their application for federal funding will no longer be reviewed, are not eligible to apply.
  • Please note: If your federal funding was a multi-year award that required you to reapply competitively each year (i.e., funding was not guaranteed annually) and your funding has ended, you are not eligible to apply.
• Applicants who lost funding but have since regained access (i.e., teams whose funding has been reinstated are not eligible to apply).
• Project Directors receiving greater than 50% of their salary from an active RWJF grant are not eligible to apply.
• Applicants whose research focuses solely on populations outside the U.S. or its occupied territories are not eligible to apply.
• Applicants whose research does not focus on advancing racial or Indigenous health equity are not eligible to apply (over-representation of Indigenous Peoples or people of color in your research study is not sufficient).
• Applicants whose research is focused on pharmaceutical, biomedical, clinical, or basic science are not eligible to apply.

Yes, if you have had multiple federally funded projects interrupted, you may submit a brief proposal (BP) for each interrupted project. Applicants may submit multiple BPs or serve as a partner for another organization's BP. There are no rigid restrictions against multiple submissions from the same applicant. However, there is limited funding available and it is unlikely that multiple awards will be made to the same applicant.

Yes, more than one application from a single organization may be submitted. However, we are prioritizing a diverse portfolio of grants, including organizational diversity; so, the number of grants awarded to one organization may be a consideration when making final funding decisions.

No. Grants are restricted to one award per previously funded project. Therefore, we encourage teams to apply collaboratively rather than submitting multiple applications for the same project and work together to determine the most pressing needs to include in the application.

Not through this CFP. Research must be focused on U.S. settings, populations, and communities in alignment with RWJF’s mission to improve racial and Indigenous health equity in the US and its territories.

Yes, interested applicants may apply to other RWJF funding opportunities. Each funding program of RWJF has distinct objectives, funding guidelines, and criteria. To learn more about other funding programs and initiatives at RWJF, visit https://www.rwjf.org/en/grants/active-funding-opportunities.html.

Project directors currently receiving greater than 50% of their salary from an active RWJF grant are NOT eligible to apply. Former RWJF grantees and people currently receiving less than 50% of their salary from RWJF may apply.

Funding requests should only be for activities that applicants had yet to complete on the original, terminated grant. This can include salary support, participant incentives, dissemination activities (e.g., open access fees, conference presentations, product development), tuition and other support for graduate students, and other research costs. This must NOT include funding to conduct NEW research activities, aside from additional funding for dissemination to reach the $50k minimum grant threshold.

Grant durations up to 24 months are permitted.

Awards may range from $50,000 to $200,000, inclusive of all budget periods and indirect costs. We ask that applicants request only what is needed to allow for maximizing support for as many recipients as possible. We expect larger awards to correspond with more distributed funding (e.g., multiple people’s salaries or multiple activities). The requested amount must be equal to or less than the funding that was guaranteed and remained unspent on the original project.

Indirect costs, also known as F&A or overhead costs, are limited to 15% for colleges/universities and hospital or health systems, 30% for other nonprofit organizations, and 0% for for-profit or government entities. These are fixed rate and are nonnegotiable. 

Our goal is to support as many early-to mid-career, antiracist, anticolonial health equity researchers as possible with the available funding. The exact number of grants depends on the size of the grants awarded, but we anticipate funding between 25 and 60 projects.

Applicants will be notified of funding decisions the week of November 17, 2025. Grants are anticipated to begin by January 15, 2026. However, we will attempt to disburse funds as expeditiously as possible, potentially prior to that date. During the submission process, applicants will indicate the level of urgency with which the funds are needed. Be discerning in your response, as we will prioritize processing fund disbursements to those who need funding more immediately (e.g., to avoid a job termination).

Selection criteria can be found at the top of page 4 in the Call for Proposals.

Brief Proposals are reviewed by members of the E4A leadership and review team and RWJF staff. All final funding decisions are approved by leadership within the Foundation's Research-Evaluation-Learning Department.

Appropriate documentation includes termination letters, stop work orders, emails or other communications directly from the federal funding agency, and any other official letters or communications (e.g., phone calls from a program officer) regarding termination, discontinuation, or freezing of federal research funding. If your work was interrupted due to a non-responsive federal program officer, you may submit email chains and/or a “log” of attempted contacts (you must demonstrate multiple attempts made). If you have questions about appropriate verification, please contact the program office (evidenceforaction@ucsf.edu).

No, when prompted to do so, you should submit the original documentation from your federal grant application (e.g., original research aims/questions, original budget narrative/justification). Do not create new documentation that was not submitted as part of your federal funding application. Applications that do not include original documents from the federal grant or that include modified documents will be turned down.

We will not require grantees to return funds once they are awarded, even if their federal funding is restored; but we may decide not to pay out the entire award if you are able to access all your federal funding during the grant period.

Applications must be submitted by 3:00pm EASTERN TIME on October 1, 2025. Late submissions will not be accepted. We highly recommend that you plan to submit your brief proposal well ahead of the deadline to avoid any technical issues or other delays. Applicants will receive an email notification from MyRWJF indicating that the application has been successfully submitted.

If you do experience technical difficulties or do not receive the email confirmation, please contact the program office right away at evidenceforaction@ucsf.edu.

All RWJF grantees are required to submit annual budget reports. Grantees will be welcome, but not required, to participate in interactive training opportunities and workshops, in-person and virtual networking events, and other E4A- and RWJF-sponsored events.