Proximate social entrepreneurs are leaders who have firsthand knowledge of the communities they seek to drive impact in. This is because they are actually a part of that community, work with the community and/or they are meaningfully guided by that group’s inputs, ideas, agendas and assets and then use that knowledge to develop solutions. In Promise’s context, this is specifically in order to address the key barriers to equitable outcomes for children ages 0 - 5, caregivers, and their families.

We invest in proximate leaders because we believe they have the greatest potential to transform the early childhood field, but face the greatest obstacles, especially at the earliest stages of social entrepreneurship. 

Criteria with the full definition and evaluation of proximate leaders coming soon.

The Promise Fund was developed in acknowledgement that flexible funding isn’t as common as it should be for early stage entrepreneurs. We invest in leaders we believe in, and we trust their judgement around the use of their funds. Our reporting requirements are designed to be simple, impact-focused, and not overly detailed on spending. If you have questions, please contact us to discuss.

For tax and compliance reasons related to the structure of these awards, any for-profit award winners without 501(c)(3) status must use the funding for charitable purposes, according to IRS definitions. One of the practical implications of this requirement is that the funding may not be spent on buying or developing assets or developing technology.

This award is intended for leaders with clearly defined ideas that they are ready to test and refine.

Leaders may have done some light work to validate their ideas, potentially including input-gathering with the community, but they have not yet fully developed their offerings or undertaken substantial pilots. We are looking to support leaders who have raised or earned less than $100k with their proposed ideas. (Most will have raised or earned $0.)

~4-6 hours per week for 6 months; there will be available workshops and peer spaces; beyond this additional time is anticipated for participants to build and implement their pilot.

In 2026, we expect to select up to 10 recipients of the Imagine Award including $20,000 in funding alongside capacity-building programming.

We see trust, choice, and clear program milestones not as competing ideas but as complementary forces that help leaders achieve their goals. In the pilot year, we've learned, many leaders express their aspirations and needs through a fundraising lens: the need to raise more funds to continue working towards their idea. Our role is to translate those aspirations into the necessary capacities that enable them to create evidence and generate funding or revenue that aligns with that potential.

That means our milestones both honor a leader's vision and make visible the conditions funders look for: clarity of impact, a viable business model, and a capable team.Setting milestones together, with flexibility for each founder's context and goals, allows us to respect a leader's agency and wisdom while providing the structure and resources that can turn their ideas into fundable, sustainable ventures.

In short, trust means believing leaders know where they want to go; our milestone framework makes explicit the capabilities: validation, impact and business model thinking, and that helps them build evidence and attract the resources they need.

Promise has stewarded two main communities: the Early Childhood Leaders of Color Collaborative (EC LOC), a space where we unite BIPOC and proximate innovators to drive personal sustainability, social capital, and collective power, and the Promise Venture Network (PVN), a community for leaders interested in their ventures’ growth and impact. Promise also has a history of connecting ventures to sources of capital, customers and potential partners in order to facilitate the field’s most equitable marketplace of capital to ventures. Award recipients will be able to tap into the both power of our diverse networks and our connections in order to drive their progress forward!

For our pilot year, we’ve selected four award recipients (previously referred to as the Promise Sandbox Award) from across the country who have ideas for transformational impact.

2025 award recipients are proximate to their communities as a part of our commitment to empowering those with firsthand understanding of the aspirations of and opportunities for children, parents, and families within their communities. Our inaugural cohort of award recipients also brings deep community connections, a strong equity focus, and an entrepreneurial mindset.

The Promise Sandbox Award has been renamed the Imagine Award as part of a rebrand. This isn't a completely new award — the core purpose remains the same — but we've updated and added to certain elements of the program based on feedback and lessons learned during our pilot year. Any future references to this award will use the new name, the Imagine Award.

The support we provide award recipients is borne from the needs they articulate; we are partners, not gatekeepers, not supervisors.

Our award recipients set their impact targets and the metrics that contribute to the measurement of our own impact. To the extent it is beneficial, we help award recipients establish clear learning goals and design pilots and strategies to explore those goals. Award recipients will help co-create and shape their program experience by identifying the workshops, resources, and relationships most relevant to their goals.

A note about the broader goals of the Promise Fund:

Beyond offering direct funding, Promise Venture Studio is engaging in a field-building effort to elevate the powerful ideas, ventures, and leaders shaping the future of early childhood development. Our goals include illustrating the urgent need for more early-stage funding and making a compelling case to other funders for deeper investment in proximate social entrepreneurship in early childhood development.

Your application is a key part of this effort. We may draw on the information you share to (in aggregate):

• Demonstrate the breadth and potential of innovation in this space,

• Highlight stories that help funders understand the real-world impact of early investment, and

• Inspire greater support for this fund and the leaders, organizations, and ventures it backs.

With your application submission, you’re agreeing to allow us to learn from and potentially lift up the story of your work. That said:

• We will never share identifying or organizational details publicly without your explicit permission.

• We will never share your original ideas publicly without your explicit permission.

• If we’d like to feature your idea or venture in any public-facing materials or fundraising efforts, we’ll contact you first to confirm your consent and collaborate on how your story is shared.

• If at any point you would like to opt-out of our storytelling efforts, please contact us at fund@promisestudio.org.

We are committed to approaching this work with care, consent, and transparency—because storytelling should never come at the expense of the storyteller.

The Promise Fund is a catalytic, philanthropic impact fund by Promise Venture Studio that supports proximate leaders reimagining early childhood through community-rooted innovation. We provide capital and support at the earliest stages through two awards: the Imagine Award and the Build Award. Learn more here.