Knight Emerging City Champions Program 2025-2026 for U.S. ($5,000 in seed funding) – YOA

Deadline: May 28, 2025

Applications are open for the Knight Emerging City Champions Program 2025-2026. The program invites younger civic innovators, ages 18-35, enthusiastic about driving transformative change in Knight Foundation’s eight resident communities to apply. This is a singular OPPORTUNITY to obtain funding and construct management expertise whereas contributing to significant, inventive options for native challenges.

The program seeks inventive younger leaders with daring concepts that strengthen belief and neighborhood connection, foster inventive expression and construct native resilience.

The KECC program was created to assist and higher equip rising leaders with the sources and coaching to show their concepts into motion. This would be the eighth cohort of KECC. Since its inception in 2015, this system has helped catalyze greater than 130 public area and civic engagement initiatives in communities throughout eight Knight cities. Projects have ranged from beehives and jukeboxes to mentorship applications and gamified co-design instruments.

Benefits

• Twenty profitable candidates will obtain $5,000 in seed funding and a $500 tech grant to assist implement their mission concept, ongoing digital coaching, technical assist from 8 80 Cities and entry to a nationwide community of inventive urbanists.

Eligibility

• Applicants should dwell in the U.S., they usually should be aged 18-35 years previous on the time they apply.
• Applicants should have the ability to journey to Canada between August 13 to 16, 2025, for the KECC Studio.
• Applicants should suggest a mission that connects residents in their neighborhood, fosters inventive expression, and/or builds native resilience. The mission should happen in one of many 8 resident communities the place Knight Foundation invests.
• Applicants should have the ability to attend the Virtual Orientation on August 4, 2025, from 6 – 8 pm EST.

Application

Applicants should submit their concepts by May 28, 2025, 11:59 pm EDT (8:59 pm PDT).

Click here to apply

For extra info, go to Knight Emerging City Champions Program.