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MattBurr
Steel Contributor
Jun 29, 2025

Suggestions for improving the nonprofit grants and discount program

Over the last few years, a number of changes to the grants and discount program have taken a bit of the shine off the program (removal of Dynamics 365 Sales grants, Business Premium, Power BI Premium, retirement of Fundraising and Engagement). I wanted to offer some suggestions based on feedback from nonprofits and partners on small changes that could make an improvement to the program.

  1. Allow all nonprofit staff (including contracted staff) and volunteers to use grant offers (i.e. allowing nonprofits to assign granted Business Basic licences to volunteers) 
  2. Increase the Microsoft 365 Copilot discount - many nonprofits still find the discounted cost prohibitively high
  3. Replace the 10 free 'Power Apps per app' with 10 free 'Power Apps Premium' - encouraging nonprofits to use the Power Platform more.
  4. Broaden your eligibility criteria to include Social Enterprises such as Community Interest Companies in the UK, Social Traders in Australia, etc
  5. Provide nonprofit staff and volunteers with free certification exams for foundational level topics (Microsoft 365, Azure, Power Platform, etc)

Let's make the program a leader in the sector again, especially for the smaller, resource-constrained nonprofits that do so much good.

Thanks
Matt

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