Walter Grant

The Walter Dean Myers Grant program was established to provide grants of $2,000 each to promising diverse writers and illustrators who are currently unpublished. Since 2015, we have awarded 16 grants, and we are set to award 10 grants in 2020.

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Prior recipients have secured literary representation and book deals, including our 2015 winner Angie Thomas who used her grant to purchase a computer to complete her Black Lives Matter-inspired manuscript. That YA manuscript, titled The Hate U Give, went on to sell in a 12-house auction, received 8 starred trade reviews, and is now a #1 New York Times’ Best Seller and a major motion picture.

Guidelines

SUBMISSION WINDOW

Submissions are now closed for 2020. Please check back for the 2021 Walter Grants cycle.

ELIGIBILITY

Applicants must identify as diverse, as per WNDB’s definition of diversity.
Applicants must be unpublished as illustrators and/or authors. This includes both trade publishing and self-publishing. If the applicant has a book deal for an as yet unpublished book, the applicant is considered published for purposes of this grant. Essays, short stories, and articles do not render an applicant ineligible.
Applicant must be working toward a career as a children’s author and/or illustrator. This includes but is not limited to: Picture Books, Early Reader Books, Chapter Books, Middle Grade Books, Young Adult, Graphic Novels, Non-Fiction, Poetry.
Applicant must be a U.S, resident or a refugee living in the States. (Note for refugee applicants: receiving a grant might affect your income limitations and any government assistance you may receive. You may want to reach out to appropriate officials, like an immigration attorney, for advice.)
Applicant must be at least 18 years in age.

Submission Guidelines

Applicants are invited to submit an application for consideration to the Walter Grant judging committee at waltergrantapplications@diversebooks.org.

The following are required for consideration:

A cover letter expressing interest in submitting for the Walter Grant. The cover letter must include:

Full name
Any former legal names you've had that have been registered with the U.S. government*
Address
E-mail address
Phone number
Diversity the applicant identifies with.
The genre of the manuscript for which the applicant is seeking grant support.
A brief one-sentence statement by the applicant stating their name and that they have never been published as an author or illustrator.

A brief statement explaining how the applicant intends to use the grant money to further their writing career.

Maximum word count 200 words

A brief summary of the work sample being submitted. Please note: this should be a summary, not a pitch.

Maximum word count: 200 words

An essay discussing how diversity impacts the applicant’s writing and illustrating career.

Double-spaced
One-inch margins
Maximum word count: 500 words

A work sample in the genre you are seeking grant support. Please choose only one to submit:

Authors: maximum of 2,500-word sample of writing. Sample must be in the genre the author seeks grant support for.
Illustrators: minimum of 4 and maximum of 6 illustration samples.
Illustrations must be scanned and submitted as PDF. Please do not submit originals.

Please note:

If the applicant receives a book deal during the Walter Grant process, the applicant is required to notify the committee.
The applicant themselves must be diverse. Being married to, a parent of, or a sibling of a diverse person, or being someone who has grown up with diverse people, will not qualify an otherwise ineligible applicant.
Under Executive Order 13224, all 501(c)(3) organizations must confirm that grant recipients are not affiliated with federally identified terrorist groups. To comply, if you are awarded a grant, we must compile any of your former legal names that have been registered with the United States government. We are aware that we are asking for potentially sensitive information and we sincerely apologize for this intrusion. WNDB will keep this information in the utmost confidence and will never use any former name(s) in our correspondence with you.

FORMATTING

All of the above must be submitted as a single PDF document.
The applicant’s name [last name, first name] must be included in the header on each page.
The author’s first and last name must be included in the name of the PDF file.
Any submission received that does not meet these requirements will be purged without being read.

We look forward to your submissions! For additional information please read our Walter Grant FAQs and direct any questions to waltergrant@diversebooks.org.