Museum Grants for American Latino History and Culture

This program supports projects that build the capacity of American Latino history and culture museums to serve their communities, and broadly advance the growth and development of a professional workforce in American Latino museums. The ALHC program has two goals and a set of objectives associated with each goal. Goal 1: Build the capacity of American Latino museums to serve their communities. Objective 1.1 Develop, enhance or expand public programs, exhibitions, and/or school programs. Objective 1.2: Improve care and conservation of museum collections and archives and expand access to collections. Objective 1.3: Strengthen museum operations by developing new or improved strategic plans, management practices, or institutional policies. Goal 2: Support the growth and development of a professional workforce in American Latino museums. Objective 2.1: Develop and implement internship, fellowship, and mentoring programs to support people entering the museum field. Objective 2.2: Create learning and growth opportunities designed to build the knowledge, skills, and abilities of museum staff and/or volunteers.

An applicant to this initiative must meet geographic and governance criteria and qualify as one of the following types of organizations: 1. A museum with a primary focus on American Latino life, art, history, and culture that uses a professional staff, is organized on a permanent basis for essentially educational, cultural heritage, or aesthetic purposes; owns or uses tangible objects, either animate or inanimate; cares for these objects; and exhibits these objects to the general public on a regular basis through facilities that it owns or operates. 2. A public or private nonprofit agency that is responsible for the operation of a museum that meets these criteria. 3. A museum service organization or association whose primary purpose, as reflected in its mission, is to support museums whose primary focus is on American Latino life, art, history, and culture. 4. An Institution of Higher Education, including Hispanic-Serving Institutions, that will engage in the project with one or more eligible museums. Applicants should consult the Notices of Funding Opportunity for more details.

The IMLS Director takes into account the input provided by the review process and makes final funding decisions consistent with the purposes of the agency’s mission and programs. Funded and non-funded applicants are notified by email when all deliberations are complete.

IMLS will not release information about the status of an application until the applications have been reviewed and all deliberations are concluded. IMLS expects to notify both successful and unsuccessful applicants of the final decisions by email in August 2026.