Grant and Funding Programs Offered by Happy Roots Foundation

Happy Roots Foundation is a private family foundation located in Ottawa, Canada, dedicated to infant and early childhood mental health. The foundation focuses on the first six years of life, recognizing this period as critical for brain development and long-term mental health. It deploys its capital through grants and strategic partnerships with hospitals, community organizations, researchers and sector leaders that work directly with young children and their caregivers.

The foundation primarily supports initiatives in the Ottawa region and across Ontario, while also contributing to national research and sector-building efforts in philanthropy and child mental health. Funding has included clinical services, community-based support programs, research studies and knowledge mobilization projects that strengthen early relational health and secure attachment between caregivers and children under six.

Happy Roots explicitly describes its work as innovative grant making grounded in a trust-based philanthropic approach. Rather than relying on rigid, highly transactional processes, it seeks long-term, relationship-driven collaborations with its grant partners. This includes flexible, multi-year project support, early-stage funding for promising community initiatives, and investments in research and evaluation that build the evidence base for early intervention.

Examples of supported work include clinical-academic services for infant and early childhood mental health at the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario, parent coaching programs at Family Services Ottawa, outdoor play support groups delivered by Playful Mindset, culturally grounded doula and perinatal mental health supports through Rooted Birthwork Collective, and validation of the HEADS-ED Under 6 mental health screening tool through the CHEO Research Institute. The foundation also co-funds broader sector initiatives such as an academic chair in philanthropy and public awareness efforts on early childhood mental health.

A defining feature of Happy Roots Foundation is its commitment to spending down its entire endowment by 2030. The organization views its preferential tax status as a public trust and aims to return its capital to communities within a defined time horizon. Since 2020 it has already granted over $2 million to infant and early childhood development projects and plans to increase its annual granting as it moves toward 2030.

The foundation’s funding strategy places strong emphasis on prevention and early intervention, viewing early childhood mental health supports as a high-return investment for society. Grants are oriented toward outcomes such as improved attachment and caregiver-child relationships, reduced toxic stress, better access to early mental health services, and policy or systems changes that make infant and early childhood mental health a sustained government priority.

Happy Roots Foundation works closely with local experts, practitioners and researchers who understand community needs. Its primary grantee partners include pediatric hospitals, community service agencies, grassroots collectives and academic institutions. While the foundation does not position itself as a traditional open-call funder, it remains in dialogue with organizations and stakeholders in early relational health and notes that its capacity for new partnerships is limited by its time-bound spend-down plan.