The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation has issued a call for proposals for research to advance racial and Indigenous health equity.

The foundation is committed to improving health equity in the United States, and one of the ways is through its Evidence for Action (E4A), a national program that funds action-oriented health equity research, which prioritizes community knowledge and facilitates the relationships and governance structures that build community power, ownership of research, and systems change. To make progress toward racial and Indigenous health equity, RWJF supports upstream solutions that target the root causes of inequities, such as housing, education, food access and affordability, employment, and health care, all of which drive economic and other forms of opportunity. Core to this approach is the recognition that communities most impacted by systemic inequities hold valuable cultural assets, knowledge, power, lived experiences, and leadership necessary for creating meaningful change.

Research that is centered in and directly partnered with affected communities is a vital step toward shifting power imbalances within the system of knowledge production, policy advocacy, and issue prioritization. The purpose of this call for proposals is to meet the current moment through two approaches: supporting timely, actionable health equity research that has been interrupted by shifts in federal funding; and supporting community-driven research that uplifts the knowledge, expertise, and power of historically marginalized racial and Indigenous communities to develop or test solutions that advance racial and Indigenous health equity.

Through this call for proposals, RWJF seeks to build an actionable body of evidence to construct fair systems (i.e., laws, policies, norms, practices, and power dynamics) that determine resource distribution and support health equity. At the July 16, 2025, deadline, RWJF invites applications for new research support, which will support action-oriented research to address ongoing threats to racial and Indigenous health equity.

RWJF expects to award approximately eight grants in the following amounts: four grants at $250,000 each and four grants at $500,000 each. Awards may be for up to three years in duration.

To be eligible, applicant organizations must be based in the United States and/or its occupied territories. Submissions from teams that include both U.S. and international members are eligible, but the lead applicant organization must be based, and the research must focus on improving health equity in the United States or its occupied territories. Only one organization may serve as the lead applicant, which must be a community-based organization (CBO) with a strong track record of racial and/or Indigenous health equity work. CBOs eligible to serve as applicant organizations include section 501(c)(3) charitable organizations, certain for-profit organizations, local and state government agencies, and tribal organizations. If necessary, the applicant organization may utilize the services of a fiscal sponsor to support the project’s financial management and grants management and reporting activities.

Letters of intent are due July 16, 2025, at 3:00 p.m. ET. Upon review, selected applicants will be invited to submit full proposals, due December 17, 2025, at 3:00 p.m. ET.

For complete program guidelines and application instructions, see the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation website.