Johnson Opportunity Grants

The Johnson Opportunity Grant program provides funds to support W&L student projects all across the country and around the world. The grants are awarded on a competitive basis and are open to rising sophomores, rising juniors and rising seniors at Washington & Lee. The grants cover travel, living expenses, and other costs associated with the proposed project or summer activity.

Grant applicants must organize, describe and justify a worthwhile summer project. It might be an unpaid internship on Capitol Hill or a State Department internship in a foreign capital. It might involve participation in a national or international student conference. It could include research travel that will help you become a leader in your chosen field of study. Or it might be a service project that will demonstrate your commitment to community leadership. The possibilities are broad and the criteria for evaluation of applications will include both your academic accomplishments at Washington and Lee and the potential for leadership development that your project makes possible.

A committee of faculty, administrators and former grant winners will evaluate the applications.

Grants will vary in amount depending on proposed budgets and the reasonably predicted costs associated with travel, living expenses and other necessary expenditures. No grant will be smaller than $1,000 or larger than $3,000 (students with financial aid packages that include expected earnings in the summer may request an additional $1,500 to cover lost summer wages). Grants will not normally be given for projects that take place in Lexington or for programs of study that involve traditional classroom instruction and regular summer school academic credit.