Supporting early childhood innovators reimagining what’s possible for children and families through community-rooted solutions.

The Promise Fund is both a response to a systemic gap and a model for early, equitable investment practice. Our beliefs underscore why we do this work and how we strive to operate. They reflect the equity-driven, transformational culture we hope to manifest in the early childhood social innovation ecosystem.

We believe that leaders with deep community connections are often best positioned to transform early childhood systems and that investing in early childhood offers the greatest impact potential of any social investment in the country. 

We approach social entrepreneurship as an iterative process of testing and learning — one where transformation requires restoration and reciprocity, and where reflective, visible learning builds the trust-based, community-led social innovation we seek.

Two Distinct Award Programs

  • The Imagine Award offers $20,000 in unrestricted funding and a six-month cohort-based learning experience for early childhood leaders with ideas for transformative impact that are informed by deep understanding of the communities they seek to engage. Award recipients will launch a pilot within six months, testing their solutions with real users, assessing feedback, and refining their approach.

    Application opens: July 7, 2026

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  • The Build Award provides $200,000 in unrestricted funding and a 12-month partnership with Promise to help high potential, early-stage early childhood organizations with community-rooted leaders. Recipients gain capacity-building and professional development support enabling them to secure additional funding and increase their community impact.

    2026 Application cycle is closed

    Learn More

Investment Criteria

  • The ideas and ventures we fund must focus on children 0-5 and the parents, caregivers, families and communities that nurture them. We prioritize ideas and ventures that we believe have the highest potential for transformative impact in our target population.

  • We support innovative ideas and ventures that create equitable outcomes for children ages 0–5 and their caregivers. We exclusively select leaders and ventures that prioritize equity and justice in their focus, design, and implementation.

  • We prioritize ideas and ventures with aspirations and potential for long-term financial sustainability and with organizational models that align with the values required for a more just and abundant future.

  • We fund ideas and ventures led by innovators whose firsthand knowledge of and connection to the communities they seek to impact translates to unique insights and increased impact. Further, we seek mission-driven innovators who lean into the iterative process of testing and learning and both demonstrate and build teams that center a learner mindset, collaboration and the ability to execute their vision.

  • The ideas and ventures we support should be community-centered, grounded in the direct inputs and aspirations of the families and communities they are working or planning to work with.

Award Offerings

‎Flexible Capital Investments

Direct financial support to advance your work and accelerate the impact of your idea or organization. We keep our funding as flexible as possible, trusting leaders to spend money however they see fit to advance their ideas, including by paying themselves appropriately.

Distinctive Support and Community

Awardees receive support tailored to their organizational stage, impact focus, business model and leadership development needs. This includes coaching, technical assistance, network introductions, and building community between awardees and our extended network.

2025 Award Recipients

Stories from Our Community

Subscribe to the Promise Fund Blog on Substack for emergent insights, learnings, and updates from our journey supporting early childhood changemakers. Featuring contributions directly from Fund awardees, mentors, and team members, our blog showcases diverse voices working to inspire change and action in early childhood innovation.

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About Promise Venture Studio

Since 2018, Promise Venture Studio has been committed to equipping community-rooted social innovators with the resources, relationships, and runway they need to build a more abundant and just future for young children and families.

Learn more about Promise here and its impact here.