J.B. Hunt Foundation Pledges $100 Million to U. of Arkansas for Scholarships

Here are notable new grant awards compiled by the Chronicle:

Bezos Day 1 Families Fund

$110.5 million to 40 organizations to help families experiencing homelessness in 23 states.

This is the foundation’s seventh annual round of grant making to address homelessness; grants this year ranged from $425,000 to $5 million each.

J.B. Hunt Foundation

$100 million to the University of Arkansas to establish the Land of Opportunity Scholarship, which will offer tuition support to low-income students from Arkansas.

Johnnie Bryan Hunt dropped out of school in the seventh grade to support his family. He went on to found J.B. Hunt Transport Services, the largest trucking company in the United States. Hunt died in 2006.

Robin Hood

$40 million to 72 nonprofit organizations that serve low-income residents of New York City.

Bill Gatton Foundation

$21.2 million to two institutions of higher education.

The first grant of $11.2 million went to the University of Virginia’s College at Wise to back a variety of programs, including athletics, nursing, technology management and data analytics, scholarships, the Chancellor’s Greatest Needs Fund, and the Rachel Clay-Keohane Mathematics Fund, which is named for the head coach of the UVA Wise women’s basketball team.

The foundation also gave $10 million to Alice Lloyd College for its endowment.

Google.org

$20 million commitment to academic and nonprofit organizations worldwide that are using artificial intelligence to address increasingly complex problems in fields of science, including rare and neglected disease research, experimental biology, materials science, and sustainability.

Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation

$11.2 million to strengthen and expand the reach of 53 nonprofit organizations through staff support, program enhancement, upgrades to information technology and cybersecurity, communications and marketing, and general operating support.

The grantees in this round work in the areas of college access and completion, work-force and career development, and entrepreneurship.

Liberty Federal Credit Union

$10 million to the University of Southern Indiana Foundation for the naming rights to its athletics arena, which will be known as the Liberty Arena, Home of the Screaming Eagles, for the next 20 years.

NDN Collective

$8 million to nearly 200 recipients through its Collective Abundance Fund, which has given grants worth $50,000 to $25,000 each to build wealth among Indigenous families in South Dakota, North Dakota, and Minnesota.

Lilly Endowment

$7.5 million to the North Carolina Community Foundation to augment its Disaster Relief Fund, which is supporting long-term recovery efforts in North Carolina following Hurricane Helene.

The Lilly Endowment is a financial supporter of the Chronicle.

REI Cooperative Action Fund

$5.1 million to 258 nonprofit groups to make access to outdoor recreational activities more equitable.

Bristol Myers Squibb Foundation

$2.5 million to the University of California at Los Angeles to reduce disparities in lung-cancer screening across Los Angeles County.

The grant will support a multidisciplinary team of lung-cancer experts at the university’s David Geffen School of Medicine, the UCLA Health Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center, and the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health.

Hellman Foundation

$2.5 million partial challenge grant to the USA Cycling Foundation to bolster its women’s programs across a variety of Olympic and Paralympic cycling disciplines.

Of the total, $1 million will support women cyclists competing at the Los Angeles 2028 Olympic Games. The remaining $1.5 million will match gifts to its long-term Women’s Cycling Fund, which will support USA Cycling women’s programs from the years 2029 through 2043.

Getty Foundation

$1.6 million to the National Historic Trust for Preservation’s African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund to back its efforts to conserve modernist buildings at Black historic and cultural sites.

NVLD Project

$1 million to the Child Mind Institute to establish the Non-Verbal Learning Disability Research Fund.

State Employees Credit Union Foundation

$1 million challenge to SPCA of Wake County to help build its Regional Campus for Pets and People, which will offer low-cost veterinary care and a learning center for new or potential pet owners.

New Grant Opportunity

South Arts, in partnership with the Wallace Foundation and the Community Foundation for Greater Atlanta, is accepting proposals for its Cultural Sustainability grants, which will award a total of $1.14 million in general operating support to arts organizations in nine southern states. Arts groups in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee that serve and engage communities of color are eligible to apply. Organizations’ annual operating expenses must be under $500,000, and may apply for grants worth up to $150,000 each. Applications are due February 5.

Chronicle of Philanthropy subscribers also have full access to GrantStation’s searchable database of grant opportunities. For more information, visit our grants page.