What Does Deaconess Foundation Fund?

Deaconess Foundation funds organizing, advocacy, and policy change in Eastern Missouri and Southern Illinois. Its stated purpose is to address racial inequity as a systemic problem, on the reasoning that the challenges people face are compounded—housing, health, education, and economic opportunity all affect one another—so single-issue fixes rarely hold. If your work is direct service, individual crisis relief, or located outside those two regions, this is likely not a fit.

The three funded approaches

The foundation names three overlapping categories rather than a list of programs:

• Organizing — building and sustaining community power, typically through membership-based or grassroots groups.
• Advocacy — pressing specific decisions, institutions, or officials.
• Policy change — shifting the rules, funding, or structures that produce the inequities in the first place.

These are presented as connected: organizing creates the base, advocacy applies pressure, policy change locks in the result. A proposal that only does one in isolation is a weaker match than one that shows how the three reinforce each other.

Geographic focus

Funding is limited to two areas:

Work outside these two areas falls outside the stated focus, regardless of how well it matches the issue areas.

Why "compounded" is the operative word

The foundation's own framing is that it is "difficult to survive and thrive in a racist set of systems," and that the challenges are hard to separate because "each issue dramatically impacts the others." Practically, that means a strong fit is work that treats problems as linked—for example, a campaign connecting transit access to job access to health outcomes—rather than a program that addresses one symptom in isolation.

Where to find specifics

The What We Fund section of deaconess.org is the authoritative source for current priorities, eligibility, and how to apply. Grant cycles, deadlines, and application requirements change, and the site is the only place those are stated accurately. Start there before drafting anything.

Quick self-check

You are probably a fit if you can answer yes to all of these:

1. Is your work based in Eastern Missouri or Southern Illinois?
2. Does it involve organizing, advocacy, or policy change—not only direct service?
3. Does it treat racial inequity as structural and connect multiple issues rather than one?
4. Can you point to the specific decision, policy, or power dynamic you are trying to change?

If any answer is no, check the What We Fund page anyway—priorities are set by the foundation, not by this summary.