Community action team

Vermont Grant Program

The Vermont Community Action Teams (CATs) are groups of employees at each of Ben & Jerry’s three Vermont manufacturing and office facilities. They offer general or project support within the broad guidelines and funding provided by the Ben & Jerry’s Foundation. Every month, the CATs make small grants, generally under $2,000, to various local, community-based Vermont non-profit programs. In addition to making small grants, the CATs plan community service projects for all employees at their sites.

DEADLINE: Applications reviewed monthly.

Requirements
Priorities
Areas not funded
Application Process
Deadlines
Faqs

Requirements

To be considered for funding, each applicant organization must be:

Located in Vermont
A local, community-based, non-profit, 501(c)(3) organization, OR
An organization that has a fiscal agent with 501(c)(3) status, OR
A school or municipality

PrioritIES

Funding preference will be given to organizations that:

Focus on under-served populations including seniors, youth, low-income and communities of color
Address basic human needs and the needs of underserved areas of the state
Improve access to housing, food, health care, elder and child care
Have a strong volunteer base
Can demonstrate the support of their community
Don’t rely exclusively on funding from the Ben & Jerry’s Foundation
Might not have access to more mainstream sources of support

Areas Not funded

Unfortunately, we cannot consider requests for:

Individuals or scholarship programs
Organizations or programs that are focused or based outside the state of Vermont
Statewide programs or organizations (local affiliates are fine)
Businesses or business association
Other foundations or regranting organizations
Religious organizations (unless they provide outreach programs that benefit the broad community)
National organizations
Discretionary or emergency requests
Programs or purposes that may be perceived as directly benefitting a Ben & Jerry’s employee or their family members

ApplicAtion Process

CAREFULLY REVIEW THE

Eligibility Requirements

TAKE NOTE OF ALL THE ITEMS LISTED ABOVE

TAKE THE

ELIGIBILITY QUESTIONnAIRE

GET STARTED ▸

CREATE AN ACCOUNT

OR LOGIN TO YOUR EXISTING ACCOUNT

APPLICATION SYSTEM LOGIN ▸

APPLY

Deadlines

Applications may be submitted online through our grants management system at any time and are reviewed on a monthly basis.

Frequently asked Questions

Due to staff limitations we are not able to meet with potential applicants. We encourage all potential applicants to review our grant partners page to better understand the type of organizations we fund and our typical giving amounts. If, after thoroughly reading all of the information detailed on this website, organizations have additional questions, they are welcome to email or call the Foundation directly.

We don’t have a limit on the number of times an organization may apply, but we do recommend moderation. An organization may only be funded once each calendar year.

No. We will only consider one application at a time across our grant program options, and thus recommend researching each program to ensure your organization applies to the most targeted program for your needs.

All of our CAT grant decisions are recommended by teams of Ben & Jerry’s employees based at three separate sites: Waterbury, St. Albans and South Burlington. Each team reviews requests from a region of the state, depending on where the applying organization is based.

You may submit your Vermont Community Action Team grant request at any time during the year, however, we cannot guarantee that the application will be reviewed within a month of being submitted. The teams meet almost every month of the year, and each team has their own timeframe for when they complete their grantmaking meeting, which means we would not be able to give a specific deadline to ensure it is reviewed that month. Typically, if an application is submitted within the final weeks of any given month, it has a greater chance of being reviewed in the following month.

Yes, we will be in touch with every organization to share our decision, funded or not funded.

We do not accept mailed requests for support. All applications must be submitted online through our grants management system. You will need to first register your organization before applying online through the grant program.

An organization should not be registered more than once into our online system. If the organization does not have a record of their log in details for the online system, please get in touch with the Ben & Jerry’s Foundation so that we can add you to the list of contacts and provide you with your log in. If you have gone ahead with registering the organization and created an account and are worried that you cannot see the organization history, please contact us to allow us to connect you to the correct account. Please contact Dana Jeffery at 802-495-1378 or info@benandjerrysfoundation.org. We will attempt to resolve any issues during our usual business hours Mon-Fri 8am to 5pm, EST.

The questionnaire may only be completed once per year. We encourage an organization to have assessed their own eligibility by reading the details regarding each grant programs’ funding priorities prior to taking the Eligibility Questionnaire. Questions may steer you to a program that has different eligibility criteria than that of the program you are intending to apply to, and therefore it is best to be mindful about which program you are wishing to get support from, as you complete the questionnaire.

If you completed the Eligibility Questionnaire, you can look at your Applicant Dashboard within the grant portal to view your submission. On the Active Requests tab, the top of the list shows your Eligibility Questionnaire, and by clicking on View Eligibility Questionnaire, you will see the responses you selected. If you do see that you answered something incorrectly, you will not be able to edit this questionnaire, but you may reach out to the Foundation to discuss your options.

From time to time applicants come across some browser issues, or experience some errors using the online grants management system. If you are familiar with clearing your cookies and cache on your browser or have tried using a different browser to complete the application and still encounter problems, please review the “Common Issues Addressed” in the (new) Tips & Tricks document tutorial document. If you have attempted all fixes, and continue to have difficulties, please contact Dana Jeffery at 802-495-1378 or info@benandjerrysfoundation.org. We will attempt to resolve any issues during our usual business hours Mon-Fri 8am to 5pm, EST.

Grant Partner Highlights

PAST Grant Partners

The documents below feature lists, by year, of the organizations and programs we’ve funded in the past. Not only is it inspiring to see all of the impactful work happening around Vermont, reading through these brief descriptions is a great way to better understand the types of projects that qualify for Vermont Economic Justice Program funding.

2021 VT Community Action Team Grants