Young people and their communities have brilliant ideas and see opportunities to address challenges, but their voices are not always heard and traditional funders too often overlook community-based organizations.
We help these locally-led organizations and young leaders create real, lasting change by pairing flexible, trust-based funding with targeted support that strengthens their capacity. We listen to the knowledge, experience and opportunities that young people and their communities bring, helping them explore their ideas and bring them to life.
Our theory of change recognizes that children and young people themselves sit at the heart of a wider ecosystem that helps them reach their potential and advance their rights. Alongside these young people and our community-based partners, we can both draw on the experiences of that ecosystem and, in turn, influence it.
Resilient and transformative partner organizations
Feel empowered to advocate for themselves and their communities
Create and advance child- and youth-centered programming
Amplify the visions and voices of local communities
Grow stronger and more responsive to challenges
Nurture, sustain, and benefit from connections with others
Enhance child and youth leadership and participation
Strengthen organizational practices to become more adaptive, creative and resilient
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Children and young people
Thrive in safe, nourishing, and empowering communities
Have access to education and life opportunities
Become future leaders and changemakers
Understand and exercise their voices, agency, and rights
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Global Fund for Children
Offers flexible funding
Fosters networks
Builds trust-based relationships
Strengthens safeguarding
Fuels emergency responses
Supports community-driven change
Advances meaningful youth-led engagement
Our model shifts power to community leaders
For more than 30 years. we have identified high-potential, community-based organizations, funded them, and forged connections to help them drive change.
We shift power by providing community-based organizations with long-term, flexible funding, and capacity strengthening support. We weave networks among peers and other funders to better connect them to the resources, people, and information that help them advance the wellbeing of the young people they serve.
We find
We seek out innovative community-based organizations, typically in the early stages of development, run by local leaders working on initiatives that address critical social issues faced by children and young people.
We fund
Our flexible, long-term funding gives organizations the unique opportunity to advance what is most important to them.
We strengthen
We create trustful relationships with our partners, so we can understand capacity challenges and accompany our partners through them.
We connect
GFC partners join together in initiatives rich in opportunities to convene, to learn from peers, and to work collaboratively to remove barriers to the wellbeing of young people.
We stand proud
Some partners reach great scale, while others increase impact by going deep, but our partners typically become stronger, better connected, and more confident in achieving their visions.
Long-term partnerships help local organizations grow in a healthy way and run sustainable programs. This leads to good and long-lasting changes in communities.
Anna, Youth Center Coordinator, Informal Education Center “Diversity”, Moldova
Flexible funding for me is having a choice and a voice. When an organization receives flexible funding, it empowers and unlocks our agency to be able to try innovative things, try out new projects and try out what the best solution is for a challenge that we are trying to address.
Lawrencia Awuku, Board Member, Move the World, Ghana
It is important for young people to have a voice in shaping the discussions and decisions that will impact their future. Their unique perspectives and ideas can contribute to more holistic and effective solutions in the society. I believe that young people have the potential of bringing positive change, and I am confident that after the summit, we will be in the best capacity to create change in our different communities.
Augusta Kassigbie, Children’s Forum Network, Sierra Leone
