Grant Opportunity Related to New Out(sider) Preservation Initiative

CCHA is pleased to share this announcement from our friends at the Out(sider) Preservation Initiative (OPI) based at the University of Virginia, which includes Maryland:

Out(sider) Preservation Initiative (OPI) Grants are open to descendant-led projects that lead to diasporic return and increased public interest in historically Black settlements.

Successful proposals may include creative storytelling, commemorative events, and educating the public about historic Black Settlements in ways that leverage the arts or technology (digital exhibitions, curation, mapping). Grant funds support descendants of community members with ancestral roots, residency, or kinship to founders of historic Black settlements and their anchor institutions (churches, schools, lodges, community centers, small businesses, and landowners).

Our initiative prioritizes supporting grantees inspired by their memories, stories, and place histories to create artistic work about freedom-seeking, designing and building communities, and migration occurring in and between Texas, Washington, DC, Virginia, Maryland, North Carolina, Louisiana, California, and Nova Scotia. Eligible projects should happen in these states within settlements or where there is a concentration of settlements, even if the applicant lives elsewhere.

Applications will be accepted through the OPI website until 11:59 p.m. EST on January 17, 2025.