National Leadership Grants

National Leadership Grants support projects that address critical needs of the museum and library fields and that have the potential to advance practice in these professions so that museums and libraries can strengthen services for the American public. Projects are expected to generate results such as models, new tools, research findings, services, practices, and/or alliances that can be widely used, adapted, scaled, or replicated to extend and leverage the benefits of federal investment. National Leadership Grants have significant potential to generate positive impact through project activities undertaken as part of the grant-funded work, activities that may be complementary to the project, and through applied research designed specifically for this purpose. IMLS does not prescribe the type, focus, reach, or scale of impact required for each project, but the questions to be addressed in the application Narrative and the review criteria reflect the agency’s commitment to both advancing knowledge and understanding and to ensuring that the federal investment made through grants generates benefits to society. Applicants should keep these two aims in mind when they conceptualize their projects, identify the target group(s) they propose to reach, prepare their work plans, and formulate their intended results.