Unlock Funding Opportunities for Your Child Care Business

First Book is a nonprofit social enterprise committed to ensuring a quality education by eliminating barriers for children living in low-income communities.

All those who work with children in need can join us. If you work or volunteer in a Title I-eligible school, early childhood program, afterschool program, literacy program, shelter, health clinic, faith-based organization, or any other organization where at least 70 percent of kids served come from low-income families, you are eligible to become a First Book member. Sign up is FREE and takes about 5 minutes!

Benefits of First Book Membership:

Access to the First Book Marketplace.
24/7 access to an incredible selection of relevant, brand-new books and educational resources available at deeply discounted prices (and sometimes for free) through our award-winning eCommerce site thanks to our generous publishing partners. Throughout the First Book Marketplace, you’ll find a robust assortment of titles for ages 0-18, including recently published and popular books, plus school supplies, educational activities, digital learning resources, and much more.

Special funding opportunities to receive FREE books.
First Book works with dozens of corporate and nonprofit partners and a network of generous donors to provide opportunities for our members to receive books and resources at no cost. Once you’re signed up, keep an eye out for our emails containing promo codes, grant opportunities, or special event announcements courtesy of our generous partners and donors.

Access to the Book Bank.
Through our one-of-a-kind Book Bank, members can order brand new books and resources for just the cost of shipping and processing! Books and educational resources offered in the Book Bank are donated by our generous publisher and vendor partners and are usually available in bulk.

FREE educational resources.
Our members drive everything we do. We create free First Book Accelerator™ resources based on feedback from member focus groups and surveys. These tools bring expert-informed best practices on relevant topics like race and social justice, and social and emotional learning, and mental health support directly to educators faster and in easy-to-implement formats.

Add your voice to the movement!
When you become a First Book member, you’re adding your voice to our diverse community of over 575,000 individual educators and program leaders working across the country, united by a common mission. As our Network grows, so does our collective power to create lasting change and break down barriers to a quality education for all kids.

Community-Built Playspaces are a partnership between your community, one of our dedicated funding partners, and KABOOM!.

As a Community Partner, you’ll lead a process that will center your community’s voices — both kids and adults — to design, plan, and build a new playspace using our signature community-build model.

At the end of the process, your community will have an amazing place for kids to play. A place that allows them to fully experience the physical, social, and emotional health benefits of play. You’ll have also helped KABOOM! take one more step towards ending playspace inequity, by providing your community’s kids access to a quality playspace and by fostering a sense of belonging within your community.

Program Goals

1. Create economic mobility for Detroiters through entrepreneurship – increase incomes and grow wealth
2. Distribute program resources equitably – focus on low to moderate income Detroiters and underserved entrepreneurs
3. Create jobs for low to moderate income Detroiters and underserved communities
4. Increase access to capital for minority and women owned businesses
5. Eliminate blight by re-activating currently vacant space

How we do it:

1. Get business formalized and transactional earlier
2. Help businesses find the space appropriate to their model
3. Communicate clearly with awardees and partners
4. Provide need-based technical assistance
5. Provide subject-specific workshops
6. Facilitate loans from community lenders by focusing on capital readiness
7. Provide gap funding through grants of up to $100,000
8. Make connections to other business service organizations

Mrs. Meyer’s Clean Day and KidsGardening share a belief that the garden has the power to do more than grow flowers and herbs. It can grow people, communities, and even kindness, too. Together, we designed the Lots of Compassion Grant program to support local leaders looking to transform vacant lots into gardens to help grow compassion in their community.

About 15% of populated land is deemed vacant or abandoned, which can lead to many negative outcomes for surrounding neighborhoods, including decreases in physical and mental health and diminished feelings of safety & security[1]. Lots of Compassion aims to provide resources to those seeking to transform vacant lots in their neighborhood into gardens for community growth.

Note that this grant can fund transformation of a nearby vacant lot, but not gardening activities at your program site.

The Region 3 MiFamily Engagement Center serves as a nexus for resource development and capacity-building to support youth and families prenatal to age 20.

• Your organization must provide services to those within the geographic area of  MiFamily Region 3,
• Your organization must be a non-profit, 501(c)(3), school, or government agency. (For profit organizations must work with a non profit sponsor.
• No grants are made to individuals
• Grants are up to $20,000
• Deadline: July 31st, 2026

This grant funding is dedicated to MiFamily: Michigan’s Family Engagement Framework’s first guiding principle: Relationships are the cornerstone of family engagement.

Refer to and follow the scoring rubric when completing the grant application.

Grant funds will be awarded in Fiscal Year 2026 and must be fully expended within one year of the award date.

The Region 3 MiFamily Engagement Center serves as a nexus for resource development and capacity-building to support youth and families prenatal to age 20.

The literacy grant funding is dedicated to increase parental knowledge regarding literacy instruction practices for families’ birth through 5th grade.

• Your organization must provide services to those within the geographic area of  MiFamily Region 3, 
• Your organization must be a non-profit, 501(c)(3), school, or government agency. (For profit organizations must work with a non profit sponsor.
• No grants are made to individuals
• Grants are up to $20,000
• Deadline: July 31st, 2026

Grant funds will be awarded in Fiscal Year 2026 and must be fully expended within one year of the award date.