We are a multi-donor fund that finds, funds and strengthens catalytic community-based organizations (CBOs) that are working with their communities to address significant gaps and challenges for children in eastern and southern Africa.
Our approach is founded on our experience and evidence that communities can best determine and sustain the change they want to see – and that CBOs are best placed to support communities in this way.
We have disbursed more than 2,000 grants in 12 countries, impacting some two million children, parents, caregivers, professionals and community members during more than 25 years of operation.

In order to support CBOs, we strategically invest capital that we raise from major foundations, family foundations, and individual philanthropists. Our model of support for CBOs has several core components that we employ in an adaptive process through constant learning and refining. Learn more about our model here.

Children are key to a brighter future for their communities and represent the greatest opportunity to realize long-term gains for the region. Yet gaps remain in learning outcomes, protection and poverty eradication. Most worryingly, there are persistent disparities experienced by young women and girls, as well as children and youth with disabilities. Climate shocks, conflict and displacement, and the digital divide increasingly compound these challenges.

A community is a social group of any size whose members reside in a specific locality, share government, and often (but not always) have a common cultural and historical heritage. Since our work is most often centered in rural (as opposed to urban) contexts, community refers to a village or collections of villages or other similar-sized governance structures. Our view of community pays heed to families and individuals (marginalized or not) and to formal and informal leadership and organizational structures.

Community-based organizations are indigenous nonprofit or civil society groups that work at a local level to improve life for residents. Unlike other organizations (such as local NGOs or international NGOs), community-based organizations arise from the local community and in direct response to their needs. CBOs are not NGOs founded by outsiders. They are not INGOs staffed by locals and they are not national NGOs founded outside a community structure. They leverage existing community resources and outside investments to improve the lives of community members in the short and long term.

A community is a social group of any size whose members reside in a specific locality, share government, and often (but not always) have a common cultural and historical heritage. Since our work is most often centered in rural (as opposed to urban) contexts, community refers to a village or collections of villages or other similar-sized governance structures. Our view of community pays heed to families and individuals (marginalized or not) and to formal and informal leadership and organizational structures.

• They exist at the nexus of the child and the community.
• They understand and can respond to local contexts.
• They have the reputation, connections, and gravitas to shift norms.
• They are geographically well-placed in remote, hard-to-reach, underserved areas.
• They have familiarity with community and earned trust.
• They are well-positioned to engage communities in their own change.
• They are the link connecting networks (families, schools, government, private sector).
• They complement and strengthen the reach of any existing services.

Like any other organization, CBOs need financial, technical and organizational support in order to grow and be more effective. Rural CBOs, because they are often isolated, benefit tremendously from learning opportunities from within and outside the community. They know what the community needs but lack the means to access resources. We continue to serve CBOs that serve children because in our 25 years of experience we know that when they thrive, families and children thrive.

Many well-intentioned donors identify problems and solutions without fully engaging the people they seek to serve. In contrast, we prioritize:

• long-term, flexible funding for local grassroots, community-based organizations;
• participatory learning and action to enable communities to identify problems and solutions;
• technical, programmatic and organizational capacity-building for clusters of CBOs so they may maximize learning and impact together;grantee-partner participation in communities of practice and multi-dimensional networks (of peers, global experts, consultants, etc.);
• systemic policy and normative change for children and youth;
• learning and evaluation processes that value both community practices and international standards.

Our approach, community-driven systems change, is founded our experience and evidence that communities can best determine and sustain the change they want to see. We seek to give communities, families, children and youth the agency and voice to strengthen their own local and national systems and structures – and to help develop the next generation of changemakers. Learn more about our model here.

We prioritize organizations that listen to and are deeply connected to their communities. Instead of simply evaluating them by the size of their operating budgets or current abilities, we look for their potential to grow in their impact and ability to engage community in shifting systems for children and youth both in their communities and beyond.