Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences

Please follow all instructions. Failure to do so may result in the disqualification of your application.

Grant requests must target a concrete program. Requests for general support are not allowed.

Proposals must be received by January 15, 2010. Under no circumstances will extensions be granted.

Application packages may be mailed or sent via a delivery service such as Fed Ex or UPS. It is advisable that you select a trackable delivery service, especially if you are sending your package close to the deadline.

Organizations should only send a single copy of their application materials.

Grants given in this application round apply to programs that will occur from May 1, 2010 through April 30, 2011. Funding will be distributed in April 2010. All applicants will be notified of the status of their proposals by the end April.

Proposals should be sent to:

Andrew Marlowe
Chair, Grants Committee
Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences
1313 Vine Street
Hollywood, CA 90028

Application Template

Your completed proposal should resemble the following template as closely as possible; it should also be assembled in the order indicated. Do not print on three-hole paper. Do not staple any of your proposal pages. Do not use any special binding. Do not insert title or section heading pages.

1. Application Form

   Fill out the form completely. The application form is a fillable PDF that you can save on your computer if you have the most current version of Adobe reader. Please make sure that it includes your correct contact information.

2. Proposal – no longer than two pages.

   Request statement – A single sentence describing the proposed project and the grant amount requested. (This statement should also appear on the application form.)

   Proposal paragraphs – Should outline the program for which support is requested. While you are limited to two pages, the proposal should provide as much detail as possible. You should be specific as to what portion of the program would be funded by the Academy grant. You may present alternatives here, giving the committee an opportunity to select from among several possibilities.

   Some details that should be included in the proposal paragraphs (as applicable):

   • How much money are you requesting?
   • How many people do you expect to attend/participate in the program?
   • Is there a selection process for participants? If so, what is it?
   • What topics or subjects will be covered by the program?
   • Is this a recurring program or a first-time program? (If it’s recurring, describe the level of success achieved in previous years.)
   • How many times will the program be repeated? (Is it a one-time program or will there be multiple programs over the course of a year?)
   • What is the time frame for the program? (Two hours, a whole day, a weekend, a week?)
   • Will filmmakers/professionals be involved? If so, who are they? (If you aren’t sure, tell us whom you hope to have involved or list those you’ve involved in the past.)
   • What’s the length of stay for the filmmakers/professionals?

3. Organizational information – No longer than two pages.

   Mission statement – One or several paragraphs broadly describing the goals of the organization as well as delineating how the proposed program serves or expands those goals.
   

   Description of the organization – One or more paragraphs describing your organization and its history. Please include a brief outline of the yearly film-related activities of the organization.
   

   Executive profiles – Brief profiles of all the primary executives of the organization as well as any staff who will have a direct impact on the program being proposed for funding.

4. Acknowledgment Page – No longer than a page; a paragraph or list at the end of the proposal could suffice.

   A brief description of the manner in which the Academy’s grant will be acknowledged by the organization.

5. Budget – No longer than two pages.

   This should include an overall budget for the organization as well as a budget for the proposed program to be supported, with a simple breakdown of anticipated costs.

6. Proof of the organization’s nonprofit status

   All applying organizations must be non-profit. Fiscal sponsors may be acceptable for organizations not based in the U.S., but you still must prove your non-profit status in your country of origin.

7. Report – No more than one page.

   This section applies only to organizations that received an Academy grant in the previous year. Click on the “Final Report Guidelines” tab on this page for more information.

Grants awarded by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences reflect fundamental goals of the Academy – to advance the art and science of motion pictures and to foster cooperation among the creative leaders of the motion picture industry for cultural, educational and technical progress.  The Academy Grants Committee considers all applications that represent programs that foster appreciation and excellence in filmmaking, within the following guidelines:

1. are not awarded to cover the expenses of producing a film or films.
2. Grants are not awarded to support activities related to the completion of a doctoral dissertation or other academic advancement.
3. Grants are not awarded to commercial institutions or organizations, or to individuals pursuing activities related to their employment by profit-making organizations.
4. Grants are not awarded to film festivals.  The Academy has a separate Festival Grants Program.
5. Grants are not awarded for support of administrative, equipment or overhead expenses.
6. Grants are not awarded to cover the expenses involved in television research and projects.
7. All grants are awarded with the understanding that the Academy has discretion over the type and degree of recognition it receives from the recipient of such grants or others.
8. Institutions or organizations may not receive a grant for more than three consecutive years.
9. The Academy reserves the right to amend the above policy guidelines to fit extenuating circumstances or other unusual situations.

Internship Grants Guidelines

1. Academy Internship Grants funds are available to accredited academic institutions and non-profit organizations that intend to place students, either undergraduate or graduate, in internships that take place in professional environments outside of the school or organization.
2. All Academy grant monies are to be used directly by the interns, as stipends and/or as funding for travel, temporary housing and per diem expenses during the internship period.
3. The grant monies cannot be used for the administration of the program.
4. At the program’s discretion, grant monies can be used for one or more internships in a given year. However, it is preferable that the grant monies be used for as many internships as are practically possible.
5. Academy grant monies may be combined with existing internship funding to support a greater number of Academy interns during a given year.
6. Academy internships should focus on some aspect of theatrical motion picture production. Internships focused on television or the Internet should not be considered.
7. Academy internships should be available to students in all film production and production-related disciplines and are not to be limited to a single discipline. Interns could be placed on a production to observe an editor, costume designer, director or other professional. Interns could also be placed in an office, reading scripts for an agent or a development executive, observing a publicist or a marketing executive. Whatever the placement, the university program must deem it to be of benefit to the intern.
8. Grants will be distributed by mid-April each year. Internships should take place during the following 12 months. If the grant monies are not expended during that time period, they should be returned to the Academy.
9. The Institutional Grants committee should be notified as interns are identified and placed. Upon completion of the internship(s), both the institution and the intern(s) should send an evaluation of the experience to the committee. If the professional filmmaking “mentor” files an evaluation with the university program, a copy of that report should be sent to the committee as well.
10. If interns are placed on a feature film and serve in a capacity in which screen credit is granted, that credit should read “Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Intern.”
11. The Institutional Grants Committee shares prevailing concerns in the education community that it is important for programs to recognize the difficulties facing minorities and women attempting to enter the film industry.

Acknowledgment Guidelines

If there is an appropriate venue for an acknowledgment of the Academy’s financial support of your program, the Academy requires the acknowledgment be made.

Additionally, as the Academy places specific restrictions on the use and representation of its name and marks, the Academy must approve in advance any mention or representation of “Academy Foundation”, “Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences”, or the grant itself.

As appropriate, the following should be provided:

• prominent acknowledgment on material printed for a sponsored program;
• mention in press releases regarding sponsored programs;
• mention on Web site, with a link to the Academy’s Web site;
• prominent acknowledgment on any trailer or on-screen slide produced specifically for a sponsored screening program;
• opportunity to run an Academy-produced trailer at a screening program.

In lieu of or in addition to the placement of an Academy logo, the following acknowledgment line may be used:

Special support provided by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Please note: If the Academy grant is supporting a production training workshop, films produced in that workshop should not be connected to the Academy in any way. No acknowledgment of the Academy grant should be placed in any individual films or in materials connected to those films.

The 2009 Academy Film Festival Grants are directed to festivals occurring during the 2009 calendar year.

Grants are not offered to individual festivals in successive years.

Only festivals based in the United States that have held at least five festivals as of December 31 of the year prior to applying are eligible to apply.

Screening programs, be they periodic screening series or end-of-term student screening programs, are not eligible to apply. Festivals that do not screen films in a theatrical setting also are not eligible to apply.

Eligible film festivals may apply for grants at four funding levels, depending on the cash budget of the festival.

• Festivals with a cash budget of less than $100,000 can apply for a grant of up to 10% of their cash budget or $2500, whichever is higher.
• Festivals with cash budgets from $100,000 to less than $200,000 can apply for a grant of up to $10,000.
• Festivals with cash budgets from $200,000 to $600,000 can apply for a grant of up to $20,000.
• Festivals with cash budgets greater than $600,000 can apply for a grant of up to $30,000.

To maximize the distribution of funding to festivals, the Academy’s Festival Grants Committee may approve grants for less than the amount requested. In recent years, this has been the case more often than not.

A final report is required for all organizations that receive a grant. If the program that is being funded is not completed by January 1 of the grant year, an interim report is also required. Final reports are due after the program has been completed; interim reports are due on the same date that new proposals are due – for 2010 that will be January 15.

Internship program requirements are at the bottom of the page.

The report itself should be one page in length. The budget breakdown can be submitted as a separate page.

When composing your report, please use the following template. (For interim reports, cover only as much as is relevant to that point. Then discuss what is known about the remainder of the program.)

1. Identify the program and how much funding was received. Describe the program and its components, and specify how the Academy funds were used.
2. Was the program well received? What effect(s) did it have on the participants? How many people participated or attended?
3. How did the grant impact the program?
4. Are there any improvements you’d like to make to the program?
5. Describe how the Academy was acknowledged.
6. Include a final budget breakdown for the program. (separate page)
7. Include copies of any program literature and other materials in which the Academy’s logo or “special support” statement appear.

For returning internship programs:

Your report and request for continued funding can be one and the same. You have two pages to describe your program, report on the previous year’s funding and ask that the funding continue. The proposal itself can be very brief, essentially letting the Academy know that you wish to continue the program and requesting a grant amount. Be sure to include reports (not just thank-you letters) from the interns. If possible, reports or evaluations from the industry professionals who are overseeing the interns’ work would be nice to see as well. An application form is also necessary.