Sparkplug funds project to educate or support communities, including but not limited to school-age students, that move beyond traditional classroom instruction. In keeping with our justice-oriented framework, we fund education projects that engage excluded students in new ways, projects that restore knowledge that has been marginalized through racism or colonialism, and projects that rebuild community and collective problem-solving.

We're especially interested in supporting critical and investigative thinking and projects that address race, gender, and class disparities in education. We do fund community-based education and social justice curriculum development. For example, we have funded the development and sharing of curriculum that explores connections between Palestine and the US/Mexico border region to teach students to think critically about the impact of militarized border zones on youth, families, and the environment.

Some examples of education projects that we have funded in the past include:

-A program using digital tools to educate consumers on how they can support farmworkers' rights.

-A youth-led education campaign exposing and opposing militarization in their community.

-A digital platform to preserve the archives of a local black community.

-A year-long program bringing together social and environmental justice organizers to train new organizers and develop joint community projects.

We ask each grantee to send us a report in the year following your receipt of your grant letting us know how you used the funds, what impact(s) they had, and why you were or were not able to achieve the objectives you outlined in the grant proposal.