Robert & Patricia Switzer Foundation

The Switzer Fellowship Network is one of the Switzer Foundation’s most important assets.  The 500 Fellows in the Switzer Fellowship Network represent diverse fields of interest including science, law, policy, journalism, architecture and planning among others. They are based in nonprofit organizations, the business sector, public agencies and academia.  Through the Switzer Network Innovation Grants program, the Foundation seeks to tap this diverse Network’s collective potential for innovation and action to solve today’s complex environmental issues.  This grant program intends to create a pathway toward environmental improvement that starts with sharing ideas that will lead to action and results. 

Through this program, we invite Switzer Fellows to work together, and with their personal networks of colleagues and organizations, to engage in shared learning, convening, collaboration and ultimately “breakthrough” thinking and action.  Interested Fellows should be willing to take a leadership role in advancing progress on the identified issue and must share their proposed idea with the Network before the Foundation will consider an application. This builds on our belief that broader input can yield new approaches, especially from sectors outside your own famiiliar area of expertise.

This grant program is available to past and current Switzer Fellows as well as nonprofit organizations.  The Network Innovation Grants Program was created in 2012 to replace and enhance the former Switzer Collaborative Initiatives Fund.  Through this program, the Foundation will help Fellows test and improve their thinking with input from the Network, provide funding to concepts that seem most promising, and have Fellows share results and invite further feedback. Initial ideas are evaluated by staff and shared with the Switzer Network to generate further interest. 

Grant requests of up to $40,000 will be reviewed on a rolling basis.  (See How to Apply for more information on procedures and deadlines.)

Sample Network Innovation ideas include:

• Convene or collaborate with Fellows to address a specific environmental policy or technical challenge you or your organization are tackling.
• Organize a panel of Fellows to present at a conference or other high-profile meeting.
• Organize a group of Fellows to start an affinity group to write a collaborative document (e.g., white paper); develop or enhance a website, video or podcast; develop a survey or other research tool; or develop curriculum and materials and conduct training for other Fellows.
• Organize a Switzer Foundation spring retreat or study tour with tangible goals.
• Follow up on a past retreat topic, such as Central Valley water issues, river restoration and downtown revitalization in New England, or others.

Recent Network Innovation Grants are described on our website.  Please refer to the Switzer blog for Network Innovation ideas currently under discussion.

Please note the Switzer Network Innovation Grants Program is replacing the Switzer Collaborative Initiatives Grant Program.