Apply for What’s Possible Fund: Offering Core and Project-based Grants 

Deadline: 24-Sep-2024

The Children’s Rights Innovation Fund (CPIF), in collaboration with its donor and youth collaborators, has launched a new funding opportunity called What’s Possible.

CRIF invites youth activists to apply for the What’s Possible Fund aimed at supporting young activists, community workers, and organisers across many focus areas.

This fund will offer grants to directly support young activists, community workers, and organizers across many focus areas-all with the aim of providing critical direct support to advance their continued safety, wellbeing and human rights Youth-led groups and organizations may apply for core and project-based funding for up to 2 years. These grants will be awarded based on decisions made by a cohort of 10 peer youth activists and organisers from diverse sectors and causes (“The Collaborative”) from across the world who have set the parameters for this fund and will decide on the distribution of USD $1 million to selected applicants.

Types of Grants

• Applicants may choose one of the following grants to apply for:
  • Core Grants 
    • Flexible funding
    • Can be used for operations (e.g. paying your team, supplies, zoom account, etc)
    • Can support existing projects or new projects
    • Only available to youth-led groups and organizations
  • Project-based Grants 
    • Funds should be used for a specific project
    • Can support existing projects or new projects
    • Projects must be youth-led, but the project can exist in an organization that is or is not youth-led
    • Does not need to be a new project – can be for work already underway

What type of work will this fund support? 

• Social justice movements are critical to resisting and transforming oppressive systems. Through this fund, they hope to align with youth movements advancing liberation and Justice. They are especially excited about diverse types of organizing and activism including participation in popular protests, cyberactivism, and “artivism” (art for activism and advocacy), for example. Additionally, they look forward to learning about programs and campaigns that aim to protect civic spaces and individual freedoms and confront systemic and historic violence such as segregation, racism. and other legacies of colonialism.
• The What’s Possible fund will support projects that are Jed by and in support of children and young people. and that center those who have been historically and systematically marginalized. They hope to uplift efforts that are culturally-connected and community-based; strengthens local resources’ and/or provides direct community support Initiatives of particular interest might include (but are not limited to) those that promote education on climate. sustainability, civics, and public health, or those that support people in crisis, such as individuals displaced due to war, conflict, or political instability. They are also interested in work that addresses historic harms promotes the wellbeing of the children and youth leaders. and supports intergenerational networks of care and community-building for youth leaders.

Eligibility Criteria

• The Collaborative has decided to fund work led by those most often exposed to systemic risk and harm and those ordinarily excluded from funding opportunities like these. With that in mind, they invite your group or organization to apply if:
  • Led by 3 or more youth ages 11-28
  • You are an informal collective, Unregistered, or Registered organization
  • Led by and benefiting youth who have been historically and systematically marginalized (for example, young mothers, stateless individuals, persons with a disability, Indigenous persons, and/or LGBTQI+ individuals, particularly transgender, intersex or gender diverse individuals).
  • Led by and benefiting youth who have been affected by interpersonal and  systemic harm and/or violence (for example, sexual violence, gender-based violence, domestic violence, aria extremist violence; incarceration and/or detainment; armed conflict or war; colonization and segregation; forced displacement; climate change; famine; extreme poverty and homelessness; shrinking civic spaces, oppressive governments, religious fundamentalism, criminalization of marginalized identities and political instability etc.)
  • Your work/initiative serves places and communities that are under-resourced and/or hard to reach. They especially welcome those who serve areas where it is difficult to access aid and direct funding. You can be in rural (countryside). urban (city), pert-urban (around a city), and/or working-class communities. including places with limited critical resources, such as housing or electricity; low social infrastructure and access to digital spaces; and restricted educational opportunities.
  • For What’s Possible, the Collaborative is made up of 10 young people from Zimbabwe, Malaysia, The Philippines, Ukraine, Sudan, Benin, Sierra Leone, Brazil, Colombia, and Haiti. However, applicants do not have to be from these countries only!

For more information, visit CRIF.