Children, Youth & Families

We support organizations that make mental health care more accessible, timely, and responsive for children and youth. Our focus is on breaking down barriers that prevent young people from getting help, while ensuring services are delivered by licensed professionals in ways that reflect the communities they serve. The outcomes we strive to support include: 

• Improved coping skills and resilience in children and youth 
• Reduced waiting times for children and youth to access clinical and/or therapeutic services 
• Increased access to culturally appropriate, community-based care models

We support organizations that open doors for young people, helping them move from adolescence to independence with confidence and opportunity. Our focus is on approaches that build lasting pathways—supporting students to graduate high school, pursue post-secondary education, and connect with meaningful employment or entrepreneurship. We also support work that provides routes to good jobs and entrepreneurship for mothers and caregivers. The outcomes we strive to support include: 

• Increased high school graduation and access to post-secondary for underrepresented youth 
• Established routes to good jobs and entrepreneurship for youth and for family caregivers 

Food insecurity is one of the strongest social determinants of health, linked to long-term negative and chronic health outcomes. We aim to increase access to high-quality, culturally relevant food while promoting dignity, choice, and stability. We support approaches that go beyond emergency food relief and instead create sustainable systems that improve health and opportunity for children, youth, and families at the highest risk of food insecurity. The outcomes we strive to support include: 

• Improved school food programs in Ontario and Alberta 
• Expanded access to fresh, culturally appropriate food in underserved neighbourhoods through public markets and urban agriculture 
• Reduced waste of high-quality food through food rescue and redistribution 

Click here to learn more about the GTA Communities stream. 

For our General Program stream, we provide grants to qualified donees as defined by the Canada Revenue Agency — most often registered Canadian charities. If your organization is not a registered charity, you may still be eligible if you have a formal partnership with a registered charity acting as trustee. 

For the GTA Communities stream, we provide grants to registered Canadian charities and incorporated nonprofits. 

We welcome applications from organizations that: 

• Employ at least one paid staff member 
• Have filed a tax return or financial audit for the most recent fiscal year 
• Wait at least 12 months after an unsuccessful Expression of Interest or Full Application before reapplying to the Peter Gilgan Foundation 

We do not provide funding for individuals, scholarships, capital campaigns, endowments, fundraising events or galas, emergency relief efforts, government services, activities occurring outside of Canada, or organizations acting as grant making intermediaries. 

We offer three types of grants through the Children, Youth & Families program: 

• Project grants – Typically awarded for a single year, are the primary entry point for first-time applicants, and support specific programs or activities 
• Capacity-building grants – May be available to repeat grantees, helping organizations strengthen their internal skills, resources, or systems 
• General operating grants – May be available to repeat grantees whose mission and primary programs align with our strategy, to help cover core operating costs

Grants typically range from $10,000 to $100,000 per year. We rarely contribute more than half of a project’s costs or more than 10% of an organization’s overall operating budget. We aim to be one part of a strong mix of funders, not the only one.

At the Expression of Interest stage, we ask you to share a snapshot of your organization and proposal. This includes your mission, the geography you serve, who will benefit, and a project summary. We also request key documents such as an audited financial statement and a project budget. 

At the Full Application stage, we look for a deeper understanding of your work. This includes your organization’s history, how you engage and learn from community members, your leadership, detailed project activities, and evaluation plans. We also ask for an updated budget, your most recent annual report, a list of key organizational funders, and a list of board members.

Applications are accepted on a rolling basis. The process begins with a short Expression of Interest (EOI) submitted through our online portal. If invited to proceed, you’ll be asked to complete a Full Application. 

• You can expect to hear back within 10 weeks of submitting an EOI 
• If invited to submit a full application, reviews are usually completed within 10 weeks after submission 

Strong applications align with the Foundation’s focus areas and reflect a deep connection to the community being served. We especially value organizations led by people with lived or proximate experience in that community.

Strong applications share a clear plan with goals that are realistic for the time, resources, and context available, while also being open about risks or uncertainties and how the organization is prepared to learn along the way.

We are interested in how lives will improve as a result of the work, but we know our partners are the experts. We want to learn from you about how your project’s activities and outputs connect to the bigger picture of the medium- and long-term outcomes your organization is working toward. Strong applications make this connection clear, focusing on durable change rather than short-term outputs alone. 

We want to understand whether our funding is contributing to meaningful, measurable change, while recognizing that impact isn’t always linear and not everything that matters fits in a spreadsheet. Across all programs, we look at four common indicators: lives improved, alignment with the Sustainable Development Goals, organizational proximity (leadership with lived experience), and equity in programming. This information may come from different parts of your application or reporting, and we’ll work with you to gather it in a way that makes sense. 

For first-time applicants, funding is generally awarded for a single year. In some cases, repeat grantees may be considered for multi-year support when there is strong alignment between their mission and our strategy. Multi-year grants are not guaranteed and depend on the nature of the program, demonstrated impact, and available resources.

You can submit a new Expression of Interest through our online application portal once you have provided the Final Report for your current grant. Our staff will review your report within 14 business days, follow up with any questions if needed, and then close out your current grant so you can move forward with a new application.

The Peter Gilgan Foundation has a number of long-term strategic partners in our Health Care priority, and we are not seeking new partners at this time. We do not accept applications for capital campaign funding.