The Promise Fund: Imagine Award Application 2026

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Thank you for your interest in the Imagine Award from The Promise Fund! 

Before you begin:
Based on past feedback, we expect it to take anywhere from 2 - 5 hours to complete this application, including prep time. These estimates are not suggested times but purely estimates in case it's helpful to plan accordingly. Please take as much or as little time as you need to answer the questions to your satisfaction. We are not looking for perfection. :)

This application asks you to describe specific plans for piloting your idea. If you're not sure what a pilot is or would like help thinking through your plans, we encourage you to attend our free optional workshop: Design Your Pilot: A Free Workshop for Early Childhood Leaders. We created it specifically to help Imagine Award applicants think through and communicate their pilot plans.

If you'd like to save your progress and return to this application later, check the "Save my progress" option at the top of this page. (Check your spam folder if you don't see your confirmation email.)

Here are key dates to keep in mind:
  • Application due date: Friday, August 28, 2026
  • Finalists invited to interview: early October 2026
  • Notification of award decisions: early November 2026
If you have questions at any point during the process, we encourage you to: 

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 you or your idea 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.

Let's get started!

Tell us a little about yourself







Please select the name of a US state or territory or choose "other (outside the US)"

(Award winners must be at least 18 years old.)

Select all that apply.


Select all that apply.



We think most of the paragraph-response questions in this section can be answered in 3-5 sentences. We encourage applicants to keep responses brief. Either way, we are not counting words or evaluating on the basis of response length. 

Tell us about your idea:





(For example, Early Head Start is designed to impact infants and toddlers under the age of 3, including children with disabilities, and pregnant women, from families with household income at or below the poverty level or who qualify for public assistance.)




* A pilot is a small-scale version of your idea that lets you try it out in the real world and see what works. It doesn't have to be perfect — the goal is to learn.
** To help you think through specific plans for piloting your idea, we encourage you to attend our optional workshop, Design Your Pilot: A Free Workshop for Early Childhood Leaders, before completing this question. We created this workshop specifically to help Imagine Award applicants with presenting their pilot plans clearly and compellingly.


There’s no right or wrong answer here - we welcome all paths - we just want to understand how you’re thinking about it.










Feedback

We invite you to answer the following optional questions to help us make progress towards our goal of minimizing the burden we place on leaders through our application processes.




After you click "Submit" below, you'll have an opportunity to review your full application. Then you'll need to click "Confirm" at the bottom of the next page to finalize your application submission.
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