National Leadership Grants for Libraries (2023)

Background
The National Leadership Grants for Libraries Program (NLG-L) supports projects that address critical needs of the library and archives fields and have the potential to advance practice and strengthen library and archival services for the American public. The program is designed to support the achievement of agency-level goals, including championing lifelong learning, strengthening community engagement, and advancing collections stewardship and access. The program emphasizes diversity, equity, and inclusion in serving individuals of diverse backgrounds and communities.

Grant Details
The NLG-L program has five program goals with associated objectives, including building workforce and institutional capacity, improving community well-being and civic engagement, providing broad access to information and collections, strengthening services during emergencies or disasters, and promoting collaboration among libraries, archives, and museums. The program offers four project types: Planning, Forum, Implementation, and Applied Research. Each project type has specific period of performance ranging from one to three years. The program uses four performance measures to assess effectiveness, efficiency, quality, and timeliness of activities.

Eligibility Requirements
Eligible applicants include units of State or local government or private nonprofit organizations located in the United States or its territories. Eligible entities include libraries, academic institutions, digital libraries, library agencies, library consortia, or library associations. Cost share requirements vary based on project type with some projects requiring a 1:1 cost share from non-federal sources for requests exceeding $249,999.

Period of Performance
Projects must begin on August 1, 2023 and may be carried out for one to three years based on the selected project type.

Grant Value
$9,000,000 is expected to be awarded through this announcement with an anticipated number of 38 awards. The average amount of funding per award experienced in previous years is $318,606. Individual awards may range from $50,000 to $1,000,000 depending on the project type.

Place of Performance
The grant opportunity is open to organizations located in one of the 50 States of the United States of America, the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, the Republic of the Marshall Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia or the Republic of Palau.