We want to work with you to increase the impact and effectiveness of your issue campaign by providing resources to help you be successful. As a recipient of a Campus Progress Action Grant, you are eligible for funding, support from Campus Progress / Center for American Progress staff, access to our wide variety of organizing workshops and trainings, and contact with policy experts on your particular issue.

Campus Progress offers grants of $200 to $1,000 to students working on innovative and hard-hitting educational and advocacy campaigns. We want to help students leverage their passion, creativity, ideas, and organizing talents to create progressive change on their campuses and in their communities. Whether it's to promote clean energy on your campus; advocate for a living wage at your school or in your state; fight genocide in Sudan; etc., we want to help!

Check out some of the great campaigns we have helped with so far, and apply for an Action Grant now!

Grantees:

• Environmental Futurists - A student-led group at Southern Connecticut State University (SCSU) that is working to promote renewable energy among SCSU students and New Haven residents. They are currently working on a campaign to convince the SCSU administration to adopt a resolution committing the school to carbon neutrality. Additionally, the Environmental Futurists are working to create a Sustainability Coordinator position and a Sustainability Committee at SCSU. To learn more, send them an email.


• Free the Planet (FTP) – A student organization spearheading a campaign to have Grinnell College construct utility grade wind turbines on or near campus that provide enough energy to meet at least the majority of the campus’ electricity needs. They use grassroots and direct lobbying techniques to engage the campus community about the potential for harvesting the power of our prairie winds, and work with Grinnell students, faculty, staff, alumni, administrators, and trustees. FTP’s wind campaign is one component of a broader initiative to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions of the College as a whole. For more information about the FTP’s wind turbine campaign, click here.


• GLBTA Student Union - is a student organization at Wayne State University that is actively committed to establishing welcoming and safe campus environment that embodies basic principles of justice and equality for all. The University environment ought to be one that reinforces fair treatment, equal opportunity, non-discrimination, and in doing so recognizes the inherent human rights that all students possess regardless of sexual orientation and gender identity. They are working towards increasing acceptance and inclusion for the GBLT community on campus, and building support for equal school and public policies with respect to the GBLT community. For more information, email wayneglbta@gmail.com.


• KSU Eta Sigma Gamma - A health education honorary that is dedicated to providing both Kent State University (KSU) and the community with free quality health education. Eta Sigma Gamma is the lead student group of a campus coalition advocating for reproductive rights, specifically comprehensive sexuality education and equal access to the HPV Vaccine. Their goals are: (1) to increase awareness of susceptibility to HPV and the inequality of healthcare coverage; (2) to extend coverage of student health insurance at KSU to include the HPV vaccine; (3) and to gain support among state policy makers for a HPV vaccine mandate. For more information, contact Colin V. Dean or join their Facebook group.


• Living Income for Vanderbilt Employees (LIVE) - A student-led campaign at Vanderbilt University, LIVE’s goals are to (1) Secure a commitment from Vanderbilt University to pay all of its employees a living wage, (2) Implement the Ten Points for Just Employment, a comprehensive employment policy that protects the integrity of workers’ wages that also discusses anti-union intimidation, benefits, subcontracted labor, transparency of labor policy, etc. and (3) Educate the Vanderbilt community about the living wage, the inadequacy of the current wage system, the present condition of unionized labor and the importance of workers’ rights.


• Politically Aware Titans - A non-partisan student organization from Cal State Fullerton dedicated to political science students who wish to take an active interest in current politics. They are teaming up with Tuition Relief Now to help pass a state ballot initiative that will ensure tuition for state schools in California never gets raised by more than the cost of living each year. Instead the funding will come from a 0.5% tax on incomes over $1 million. The schools will also have to present their budget to a panel of parents, teachers, and students, which will provide a much higher level of accountability. For more information or to get involved, email them at PATCSUF@hotmail.com, or visit TuitionReliefNow.org.


• Springfield Citizens Against the War (SCAW) - An Illinois-based campaign led by a graduate student Michael Ziri, SCAW’s goal is to get a troop-withdrawal question added to the November ballot in Springfield, Illinois. The question is, “Shall President George W. Bush and Congress commence a humane, orderly, immediate and comprehensive withdrawal of all U. S. military personnel and bases from Iraq?”


• Students for Economic and Social Justice (SESJ) – A student group at the University of Montana acting to ensure ethical university purchasing policies. Last year, SESJ succeeded in affiliating the University of Montana with the Worker Rights Consortium (WRC), which is an independent monitoring organization that conducts investigations into working conditions around the globe. This year they are continuing this campaign by asking the university to affiliate with the WRC's Designated Suppliers Program (DSP), which enhances the enforcement of university codes of conduct regarding labor rights. SESJ believes strongly not only in direct action, but educating students across campus about international labor issues. For more information, contact Kendra Kallevig.


• Students for Staff (SFS) - A group of undergrads, graduate students and alumni at Miami University who believe in living the values of liberal education and critical thinking by putting research and knowledge into action. SFS strongly values the contributions of Miami's staff to a cohesive community, and believes that valuable work demands valuable compensation. SFS has been meeting with members of the administration, staff, and student bodies, in an effort to raise awareness of the wage issue and disparities on campus, and to generate support for the living wage campaign. They are building a coalition and seeking wider support for cooperative and collaborative measures to address the wage situation at Miami. For more information, contact Stephanie Lee.


• Students Supporting Affirmative Action (SSAA)-- A University of Michigan based organization that created and launched a visibility campaign opposing Proposal 2, an amendment to the Michigan Constitution that prohibits all state and local government entities, including public schools, from using affirmative action programs, during the 2006 election. Proposal 2 passed in November of 2006, and SSAA is currently advocating federal legislation which would allow states to continue to use affirmative action programs.


• Students United for a Responsible Global Environment (SURGE) – SURGE is a student-led network dedicated to achieving social, economic, political, and environmental justice through collective education and action. SURGE was founded in 1998 by students at UNC-Chapel Hill interested in building the progressive student movement to ensure that students have a unified impact, transforming isolated campus activists to a network that harnesses the strength of unity. It serves as North Carolina’s anchor of the nation-wide Campus Climate Challenge campaign, and hosted a state-wide summit for students across the state to learn ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.


• Sudan Divestment Task Force (SDTF) - The SDTF is an effort to unite on-campus divestment efforts from across the country, led by Brandeis student Daniel Millensom. The SDTF played a critical role in recent decisions by university boards to divest from companies that do business with Sudan at Brown, Amherst and Yale universities, and the campaign also targets state pension funds in Massachusetts and Rhode Island. SDTF students have testified at university board meetings and before state legislatures and their efforts have been covered by Boston Globe, CNN, NPR and others.


• Texas Students Against the Death Penalty (TSADP) - A student-led campaign at the University of Texas-Austin, TSADP’s goal is to get students involved in opposing the death penalty in Texas.


• University of Houston Students for Fair Trade (SFT) - A student organization that uses a two pronged approach to increase fair trade awareness: educating students, staff and faculty about how the choices we make as consumers affects farmers in developing countries; and actively working to increase the amount of fair trade products on campus putting pressure on administrators and our food service provider. SFT is working to make all coffee sold at the University of Houston Fair Trade certified. So far, they have helped convince all of the coffee vendors on campus to sell at least one fair trade blend, and convinced one campus vendor to only sell fair trade certified coffee. They have also brought fair trade businesses from the city to campus and organized educational events.