The Listening and Learning in a Polarized World Planning Grants is a grant from the Templeton World Charity Foundation that funds foundational research to map the global ecosystem of social, political, and cultural polarization.

Planning grants provide time and resources to build teams, tools, and contextual understanding needed to design large-scale comparative research on the drivers, manifestations, and antidotes to polarization, especially outside Western contexts. Successful planning grant recipients may be eligible for follow-on funding of up to $2. 5 million.

The sponsor deadline for the 2026 cycle was March 6, 2026. Eligible applicants are nonprofit organizations capable of organizing multi-stakeholder research planning teams with global reach. Planning grant awards are up to $100,000, with potential follow-on grants up to $2.

5 million.

Listening and Learning in a Polarized World Global Request for Planning Grants | Mary Lou Fulton College for Teaching and Learning Innovation Listening and Learning in a Polarized World Global Request for Planning Grants Sponsor: Templeton World Charity Foundation Solicitation Title: Listening and Learning in a Polarized World Global Request for Planning Grants Funding Amount: up to $100,000 Sponsor Deadline: Friday, March 6, 2026 Solicitation Link: https://www.

templetonworldcharity. org/our-priorities/discovery/listening-learning-polarized-world/rfp-planning-grants-2026 Increasing levels of social, political, and cultural polarization threaten the stability of societies, undermines collective action on global challenges, and impedes human flourishing.

While polarization is widely acknowledged, our scientific understanding of its fundamental drivers, manifestations, and potential antidotes remains fragmented and insufficient, especially outside of Western contexts. We lack robust, comparable data across cultures and innovative frameworks, and we have a limited evidence base for what effective depolarization looks like in practice.

This initial planning grant opportunity is a strategic investment in the foundational research required to map the complex ecosystem of polarization and depolarization globally. The USD $100,000 planning grants offered in this stage provide time and resources to build the teams, tools, and contextual understanding necessary for a new scientific enterprise on a global scale.

Ultimately, these planning grants aim to ensure the subsequent multi-million dollar research investment is transformative. Those selected for the planning grant will each be eligible to apply for a second round of funding of up to USD $2. 5 million to carry out the larger mapping project proposed in the planning grant.

We seek proposals for planning activities that will enable future research to: Develop novel, multi-dimensional models, frameworks and metrics for polarization (or depolarization) that are valid across different cultural and political contexts. Design methodologies to systematically map polarization to identify key leverage points and emerging patterns of depolarization.

This can be at any scale (e.g., communities, between groups, and across nations) Engagement with varied stakeholders such as practitioners, policy makers and community leaders. Interdisciplinary approaches. Innovative dissemination plans.

Robust capacity building plans. Solicitation Limitations: We welcome applications from researchers at accredited academic, research, and non-profit institutions globally. There are no geographic restrictions for the lead PI or institution.

We, however, will not support for-profit institutions. Eligibility & Requirements Legal Organization must be a university, research institution or non-profit organization. Must be a plan for global study with network partners based in different countries.

Must commit to preregistering the experiments in the mapping study. If you have a past or current TWCF grant larger than $260,000k and this work will build upon that, you will need matching funding to be eligible. An individual can only be involved in a maximum of 3 submitted proposals.

Other Information: For complete instructions, download our Application Guidance Document . Frequently Asked Questions Project Start Date: Projects should start by June 1, 2026. Project Duration: 6 - 9 months.

Mapping Proposals Submission: If selected for a planning grant, draft proposals for the larger project must be submitted by January 15, 2027. Award: Those selected for the planning grant will each be eligible to apply for a second round of funding of up to USD $2. 5 million to carry out the larger mapping project proposed in the planning grant.