How to Apply for Funding

This page explains our grant evaluation process and lists opportunities to apply for funding from our programs.

Table of Contents

1. Can I apply for a grant?

We find most of our giving opportunities via proactive research. But you can also apply for funding through certain programs we run: see below for more details.

If your project isn’t a good fit for these programs, you can contact us to ask about funding. However, we rarely fund proposals that reach us through this channel, and we may not respond to all inquiries.

Before contacting us, we recommend reviewing our list of focus areas to see whether your proposal matches our funding priorities. We also encourage Farm Animal Welfare grant applicants to read this guide before reaching out.

2. Opportunities for funding

If any of these programs sound like a good fit, we encourage you to apply!

2.1 The University Organizer Fellowship

This fellowship provides funding for individuals who want to direct or support university student groups focused on topics relevant to reducing global catastrophic risks or otherwise improving the long-term future, including effective altruism, longtermism, or specific cause areas. Individuals are eligible for funding at any university and may apply without a particular university in mind.

See the full post for the application link and more details on the program. There is no application deadline; we will assess applications on a rolling basis.

2.2 Career development and transition funding

This program aims to provide support – in the form of funding for graduate study, unpaid internships, self-study, career transition and exploration periods, and other activities relevant to building career capital – for individuals at any career stage who want to pursue careers that could help to reduce global catastrophic risks or otherwise improve the long-term future.

See the full post for the application link and more details on the program. Applications are open until further notice and will be assessed on a rolling basis.

2.3 Course development grants

This program aims to provide support to academics for the development of university courses (including online courses) on a range of topics related to Open Philanthropy’s work to reduce global catastrophic risks. While we are primarily looking to fund new courses, we are also accepting proposals from applicants who want to convert in-person courses into freely-available online courses.

See the full post for application links and more details on the program. There is no application deadline; we will assess applications on a rolling basis.

2.4 Request for proposals: AI governance

We are looking to fund work across six subject areas related to AI governance: technical AI governance, policy development, frontier company policy, international AI governance, law, and strategic analysis and threat modeling.

Anyone is eligible to apply, including those working in academia, nonprofits, industry, or independently. We will evaluate expressions of interest on a rolling basis. 

See this page for the application link and more details on the RFP.

2.5 Funding for work that builds capacity to address risks from transformative AI

We’re interested in funding capacity-building projects aimed at addressing risks from advanced AI. By “capacity-building”, we mean projects that: 

  • Help new talent get into work focused on addressing risks from transformative AI (including people from academic or professional fields outside computer science or machine learning).
  • Support existing talent in this field (e.g. via events that help build professional networks).
  • Contribute to the discourse about transformative AI and its possible effects, positive and negative.

See the full post for the application link and more details on the program. There is no application deadline; we will assess applications on a rolling basis.

2.6 Funding for programs and events on global catastrophic risk, effective altruism, and other topics

We’re seeking to fund programs and events in a variety of areas of interest to Open Philanthropy — including effective altruism, global catastrophic risks, biosecurity, AI for epistemics, forecasting, and other areas. We’re open to funding programs or events aimed at individuals at any career stage, and with a wide range of potential purposes, including teaching new skills, providing new career opportunities, offering mentorship, or facilitating networking.

See the full post for the application link and more details on the program. There is no application deadline; we will assess applications on a rolling basis.

2.7 General application: Global Catastrophic Risks Capacity Building

If you’d like to apply for funding from Open Philanthropy’s Global Catastrophic Risk Capacity Building (GCRCB) team and don’t fit one of the other programs on this page, fill out this form.

3. What is your process for evaluating potential grants?

Our process for evaluating potential grants is evolving, and it varies quite a bit from case to case.

When we are considering a grant, one of our staff will serve as the primary investigator and contact person for the potential grantee. This person will explain the process we intend to follow for evaluating the particular grant and answer any questions. In general, our process involves the following:

  • The investigator will have one or more initial conversations with the potential grantee, to get a basic picture of the case for the grant.
  • The investigator will aim to answer key questions about the grant, through a mix of conversations with the potential grantee, requests for written materials, and conversations with others. The depth with which we investigate potential grants varies; it will be higher for grants that are larger and/or likely to require more involvement from our staff.
  • The investigator will write up their view of the case for the grant, so that they can discuss it internally and come to a decision.
  • Grants typically will be recommended to the Open Philanthropy Project fund, an advised fund of the Silicon Valley Community Foundation. In some cases, we make grants directly from the Open Philanthropy Project 501(c)(3) or make recommendations to Good Ventures, the Open Philanthropy Action Fund (a 501(c)(4) social welfare organization), or to other entities.
  • Throughout the process, the investigator will aim to keep the grantee posted on the likelihood of receiving a grant, the likely timeline, and the likely amount of investigation that will be needed.

4. Do you require grantees to share information publicly? Are you willing to keep some information confidential?

We seek to share a significant amount of information about our work, and the work we support, publicly.

With that said, we aim to balance our commitment to information-sharing with our commitment to maximizing our impact and building strong and productive partnerships. That means:

  • We never share private information from another organization or individual without permission.
  • We share drafts of our grant writeups (upon request) and blog posts with the people and organizations discussed therein and invite their suggestions.
  • We work with our partners to make key information public without unnecessarily undermining their work.
  • We share more information about major decisions and grants than minor ones.
  • If we encountered an outstanding giving opportunity where the costs of information sharing significantly outweighed the benefits, we would fund the opportunity and refrain from discussing it. But because we believe the benefits of information sharing are substantial, we would set the bar accordingly high.