OVERVIEW: The Bob Woodruff Foundation focuses on Rehabilitation and Recovery, Education and Employment, and Quality of Life for veterans.
IP TAKE: The Bob Woodruff Foundation’s CEO Anne Marie Dougherty told IP in 2023 that the foundation’s operating model is simple: “scour the country and find an organization that’s best in class that’s solving the problem we want to solve, and then we get that organization grants.” This straightforward approach is indicative of all its grantmaking. The foundation likes programs that address a specific need with evidence-based practices and measurable outcomes.
This is a transparent funder that posts its annual financial reports on its website. With an open application process that accepts unsolicited applications, this is an accessible funder that should be one of the first sources of support grantseekers turn to when looking to fund a program that serves veterans.
PROFILE: Established in 2006, the Bob Woodruff Foundation was created by Lee and Bob Woodruff, the former co-anchor of ABC World News Tonight The foundation seeks to “ensure that [the] nation’s veterans, service members, and their families — those who stood for us — have stable and successful futures.” Bob Woodruff held a B.A. from Colgate University and a J.D. from University of Michigan Law School. He worked out of ABC News’ London Bureau and was later named co-anchor of ABC World News Tonight in 2005. Woodruff sustained a life-threatening traumatic brain injury while reporting in Iraq in 2006 when his armored vehicle was hit by a roadside bomb. He spent more than a month in a medically induced coma.
On the heels of Woodruff’s ordeal, the family established the Bob Woodruff Foundation with focus areas that include Community Building, Emergency Financial Assistance, Employment, Food Insecurity, Housing, Legal Support, and Mental Health & Wellbeing.
Grants for Veterans and Military
The Bob Woodruff Foundation partners with innovative nonprofits to find, fund and shape programs across the nation that best meet the emerging and long-term needs of today’s veterans and their families. The foundation centers all of its grantmaking on support for veterans and military families. Thus, all focus areas intersect with veterans’ causes, addressing Community Building, Emergency Financial Assistance, Employment, Food Insecurity, Housing, Legal Support, and Mental Health & Wellbeing.
- Through the Got Your 6 Network, the foundation also supports veterans. The network is “a diverse collection of national organizations” that provide information and services for veterans, active-duty service members, and military families. Some of Woodruff’s programs and services are only accessible by members of the Got Your 6 Network.
- Woodruff’s Veterans Discharge Upgrade Program – though not a grant program – works to help veterans with a Bad Paper discharge access federal benefits to which they are denied because of a less than honorable discharge.
- The foundation also hosts a series of High Impact Collaboration events on a range of issues that can drive change in the veterans funding space. The Bob Woodruff Foundation has supported a wide variety of veterans organizations including Hire Heroes USA, Merging Vets and Players, Student Veterans of America, and The Mission Continues.
- It has also supported Team Red, White & Blue (Team RWB), which helps veterans reintegrate into civilian life.
- Over the years, it has given grants totaling over $2.5 million to Move United, which “uses the power of sport to push what’s possible for people with disabilities, confronting ignorance, fueling conversation, and inciting action that leads us to a world where everyone’s included.”
Grants for Mental Health
The traumatic brain injury Woodruff received in Iraq in 2006 not only inspired the foundation’s creation, but it also ensured that veterans’ mental health remains a top priority. Dr. Margaret Harrell, the foundation’s chief program officer, told IP in 2024 that the Woodruff Foundation has “been investing heavily in mental health over the last six or seven years, and I don’t see that stopping anytime soon.”
- In its Mental Health grantmaking, the foundation works to identify and support approaches to veterans’ mental healthcare that are evidence based to maximize the effectiveness of its funding. Previous mental health grants have gone to the Headstrong Project in New York, West Texas Counseling & Guidance, Quality of Life Foundation, One Mind for Research, Massachusetts General Hospital’s Home Base Program, the Suicide and Trauma Reduction Initiative (STRIVE) at Ohio State, and the Strong Star Training Initiative at the University of Texas, San Antonio.
- Additionally, while it does not list military children’s mental health as a focus area, the foundation has pledged $1 million toward the issue. Funding goes to groups that address the needs of children in military families who face mental health challenges exacerbated by service-related stressors, including frequent moves, deployments, and caring for family members wounded in service.
Grants for Economic Development and Housing
The foundation facilitates economic opportunities directly to veterans, primarily via career services, rather than to organizations that invest in job development for vets. Housing opportunities, further outlined below, also intersect with economic opportunity via assistance programs.
- The VOWS program “facilitates career and business opportunities for veterans and service members who are returning to civilian life” through networking events and symposia.
- Woodruff also provides a Career Portal where veterans can receive resume assistance and job training on Microsoft Office and other business skills.
- In addition to career services, the foundation has made veterans’ employment and education support grants to The Employment and Disability Institute at Cornell University, Warrior-Scholar Project, Worklife Ministry, Home Builders Institute, Workshops for Warriors, Greater Washington Educational Telecommunications Association, and Four Block Foundation in New York.
The Woodruff Foundation’s Housing program supports veterans’ organizations that enable veterans to find and maintain safe and secure housing, as well as supply employment assistance, regardless of income or discharge status.
- Past housing grantees include Pathways to Housing DC, United States Veterans Initiative, Insight Housing, Minnesota Assistance Council for Veterans, Midwest Shelter for Homeless Veterans, Veteran Village, and Columbus House in New Haven, CT.
Grants for Maternal and Reproductive Health
Among the foundation’s long running initiatives is the Veterans In-Vitro InitiAtive (VIVA) program, which seeks to ensure that veterans are able to pursue having children.
- It provides up to $5,000 in financial assistance to eligible veterans for fertility and other related services.
- It provides direct, in-person assistance and supports veterans whose treatment does not qualify for VA assistance, including unmarried veterans, LGBTQ+ couples, and single would-be parents.
- To apply for the in-vitro assistance program, veterans should first register for the Got Your 6 Network here.
Grants for Disaster Aid
The Woodruff Foundation has a Natural Disaster Fund that it activates to provide support to veterans and military families who are adversely impacted by natural disasters, such as the 2023 Tennessee tornados and the flooding in Southeast Texas in 2024. Grants through this fund go to partner organizations who are members of the Got Your 6 Network.
Important Grant Details:
Woodruff Foundation grants range from $5,000 to around $500,000; however, $100,000 is the average grant amount. It gave just over $8 million in grants in a recent year.
- To receive support, veterans’ organizations and programs should work to increase access to physical and mental healthcare, develop a healthy lifestyle, “improve social determinants of health,” and help veterans transition to civilian life and thrive after service.
- Funded organizations must provide direct services to service members, veterans, and military families.
- It only supports nonprofit organizations with two years of gross receipts greater than $50,000 and who have filed a 990EZ or 990 for the last two fiscal years.
- The foundation accepts unsolicited applications throughout the year via the Got Your 6 Network Grantee Portal.
- Grantseekers should review the Application Process before applying.
- To get a better sense of the types of organizations the foundation supports, grantseekers can look over the Year in Review page and browse the foundation’s financial reports.
- To keep abreast of what the foundation is up to, grantseekers can subscribe to the newsletter.
Reach out with general questions or inquiries via the email submission form here.
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