Access to Historical Records: Major Initiatives program | MAJOR 202007

Opportunity Information: Apply for MAJOR 202007

The Access to Historical Records: Major Initiatives program is a grant opportunity from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission (NHPRC), part of the National Archives and Records Administration, focused on substantially improving how the public finds, accesses, and uses major historical records collections. The program is especially interested in projects involving early American legal records, including colonial, territorial, county, early statehood, and tribal proceedings that help document the development of the nation s legal history. While early legal materials are a priority area, the program is broadly open to many formats and collection types, including paper documents, photographs, born-digital materials, and analog audio or moving image recordings.

Funded projects are expected to produce clear public access outcomes, not just preservation or back-end processing. The program supports several major approaches: digitizing historical collections held by a single institution and making them freely available online; improving access to born-digital records; building new virtual collections that pull together related materials from multiple institutions into a freely accessible online resource; and developing new tools, platforms, or methods that make it easier for users to discover and work with historical records. The NHPRC is particularly receptive to collaborative efforts, especially when partnerships help reunite dispersed but related records across repositories. Competitive applications tend to be those that address a well-defined, field-wide access problem and produce approaches that other organizations can reuse, replicate, or scale. The NHPRC also encourages applicants to meaningfully involve the public in the project, which can include engagement strategies that go beyond simply posting digitized content online.

Awards in this category are relatively substantial and are meant for major initiatives rather than small pilots. Grants range from 100,000 to 350,000 and can run from one to three years. The NHPRC anticipated making up to five awards in this category, with a total program amount of up to 1,000,000. Funded projects were expected to start no earlier than January 1, 2021. Recipients must acknowledge NHPRC support in publicity, publications, and any products created with grant assistance. The funding opportunity is identified as MAJOR 202007 (CFDA 89.003), categorized as a discretionary humanities-oriented grant.

Eligibility is fairly broad across the archival, academic, public-sector, and tribal communities. Applicants may include U.S. nonprofit organizations and institutions (including 501(c)(3) nonprofits), U.S. colleges and universities (public or private), state and local government agencies (including county and city or township governments), and federally acknowledged or state recognized Native American tribes or groups. In other words, this program is designed to support institutions that steward historically significant records and can deliver public access at a meaningful scale.

A key feature of this program is required cost sharing. The NHPRC will cover no more than 50 percent of total project costs in the Major Initiatives category, meaning applicants must provide at least half of the overall project cost through their own contribution and or other non-federal sources. The applicant match can be made up of a mix of direct and indirect expenses, in-kind support, non-federal third-party contributions, and income earned directly by the project. However, an important restriction is that NHPRC grant funds cannot be used for indirect costs under the cited federal regulation (2 CFR 2600.101). If the applicant includes indirect costs, those must be counted on the cost-sharing side rather than being charged to the federal award.

Applications also come with standard federal administrative requirements. Organizations must be registered in the System for Award Management (SAM) before applying, keep that registration active throughout the submission and award period, and include a valid DUNS number in the application (noting that federal identifier practices have evolved over time, but the opportunity text specifically references DUNS). A complete submission must include the required federal forms (Standard Form 424 and Standard Form 424B), along with a project narrative, summary, supplementary materials, and a detailed budget. Incomplete applications are not considered, and proposals made up entirely of activities the NHPRC deems ineligible will not be reviewed. The announcement also points applicants to the NHPRC s published guidance on what it does and does not fund, and it notes that there is a separate Access to Historical Records Archival Projects program with different funding levels and requirements, which applicants should review to ensure they are applying to the correct track.

• The National Archives and Records Administration in the humanities (see cultural affairs in cfda) sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "Access to Historical Records: Major Initiatives program" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 89.003.
• This funding opportunity was created on May 16, 2019.
• Applicants must submit their applications by Jul 09, 2020. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• Each selected applicant is eligible to receive up to $350,000.00 in funding.
• The number of recipients for this funding is limited to 5 candidate(s).
• Eligible applicants include: State governments, County governments, City or township governments, Public and State controlled institutions of higher education, Native American tribal governments (Federally recognized), Nonprofits having a 501(c)(3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education, Private institutions of higher education.

Apply for MAJOR 202007

[Watch] Creating a grant proposal using the step-by-step wizard inside the applicant portal: