Ford Philanthropy Fellowship 2026 (Fully-funded) – YOA

Deadline: August 15, 2026

Applications are open for the Ford Philanthropy Fellowship 2026. The Ford Philanthropy Fellowship, powered by Watson Institute, is a totally-funded program designed for entrepreneurs and native leaders who’re advancing options centered on neighborhood improvement, schooling, and catastrophe preparedness and response. The Fellowship contains entrepreneurship coaching, dedicated mentorship, entry to monetary instruments, an unlimited community of sources, and lengthy-time period alumni assist.

Benefits

• Business & Leadership Workshops: Participate in arms-on classes centered on entrepreneurship, enterprise acumen, and monetary abilities led by skilled practitioners who’re profitable entrepreneurs and leaders themselves.
• Financial Tools & Resources: Access sensible monetary instruments, frameworks, and workshops designed to strengthen your enterprise’s monetary basis. Benefit from the experience of practitioners and Watson Institute’s broader community of specialists supporting entrepreneurs at each stage.
• Basecamps: Creating Lasting Impact: Design and lead a neighborhood-centered 1-day workshop (Basecamp) for earlier-stage entrepreneurs, with coaching and a stipend supplied to assist you in deepening the entrepreneurial ecosystem in your neighborhood.
• Pitch Training & digital Summit: Develop and refine knowledgeable, compelling pitch via devoted coaching classes. Showcase your group, progress, and impression on the Summit to neighborhood companions, mentors, potential buyers, and Ford Philanthropy staff members.

Eligibility

• You are a neighborhood entrepreneur or neighborhood chief deeply dedicated to strengthening your neighborhood via your work. Your enterprise is creating significant impression by supporting individuals, increasing entry to important companies, or creating alternatives that assist communities develop, adapt, and thrive. Your work could take many kinds, together with bettering entry to sources, supporting communities in occasions of want, advancing schooling or workforce alternatives, or constructing lengthy-time period neighborhood resilience.
• You have firsthand expertise with the challenges you search to unravel, are embedded in your neighborhood, and perceive your native context. You convey an entrepreneurial spirit, a progress mindset, and a robust need to develop as a pacesetter whereas growing your impression.
• You have been main the work or your small business/group has been working for 1-5 years, with fewer than 10 staff members or staff. You have measurable impression to point out and have secured some degree or funding via grants, investments, donations, or income. You are able to scale and achieve success lengthy-time period.
• You should have the ability to decide to the complete program, together with the digital Immersive and weekly workshops held Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays from 8:00–10:00 AM MT. They prioritize individuals who’re absolutely dedicated to energetic engagement all through your complete program. The program’s success is dependent upon constructing a robust neighborhood the place all individuals are obsessed with each studying and sharing their experiences with others.
• Applicants positioned in and creating impression throughout Germany, Mexico, South Africa, Thailand, Brazil, and Vietnam are inspired to apply. Priority shall be given to these impacting Ford plant cities and areas that face recurring catastrophe declarations.
• You search skilled-guided entrepreneurial coaching, a supportive neighborhood for suggestions, a broad mentor community to reinforce your management, and alternatives to problem your self by main a Basecamp occasion and different initiatives that profit your enterprise and neighborhood. You convey an entrepreneurial spirit and progress mindset to this work.
• Adults 18 or Older.

Application

Candidates full the web application in roughly half-hour. Submit by the precedence deadline of August 15, 2026; apply as early as doable for early consideration. Applications will proceed to be reviewed on a rolling foundation till all spots are stuffed.

Click here to apply

For extra info, go to Ford Philanthropy Fellowship.