Grants to Raise Awareness for Victims of Crime: Deadline Approaching!

By Deanna Chancellor, NCARC Director

The 2024 National Crime Victims Rights Week (NCVRW) Community Awareness Projects Grants are a great way to raise modest amounts of money that will help you spread the word about child victims of abuse in your community and your work to serve them. The grants are made available as part of NCVRW, a week dedicated to honoring crime victims and survivors, recognizing the work of the crime victims field, and raising public awareness about victims’ rights and services. The grants will reimburse up to $5,000 in costs associated with conducting public awareness campaign activities during NCVRW on April 21–27, 2024.

For example, when I was Executive Director of the LeFlore County (Oklahoma) CAC, we utilized funding to put together a public exhibition on the courthouse lawn during NCVRW. We gathered articles of clothing to represent each child served that year by the CAC. The visual impact of seeing 400 articles of clothing—infant onesies, toddler jackets, children’s dresses, teenagers’ hoodies—was extremely powerful. We also offered accompanying information and resources to child victims and their families, facilitated a victims’ impact panel, and led an evening candlelight vigil. We really felt that we got through to people who maybe hadn’t considered the needs of victims in our community, as well as to victims and their families who might not have known about the resources that were out there to support them.

The grant announcement website offers summaries of projects from around the country that can provide inspiration as you plan a campaign unique to your community. The application process isn’t too arduous. Apply by Friday, November 17, 2023, at 7:59 p.m., Eastern time.