We've emphasized the role of leadership in this annual report because we believe every transformational grant idea must benefit from the visionary leadership of an articulate and charismatic individual or team. The photo essays, the program narratives and the multimedia stories on our web site all illustrate that point.
Like those leaders, we passionately believe things can be better. Knight Foundation's twin missions are to seed and inspire great journalism everywhere, and to build strong communities in the cities and towns where our founders published newspapers.
As a national foundation with local roots, we seek opportunities that can transform both communities and journalism, and help them reach their highest potential. We believe nothing big happens without a big idea. Nothing new without a new idea. In every project we fund, the idea comes first.
Every day, we ask ourselves and our partners, "Is this truly transformational?"
We seek leaders who ask the same question, identify the best opportunities, acknowledge risk and turn the big ideas into action.
We think the ideal transformational grant:
- Has the potential to create systemic change, affecting an underlying system or structure by addressing root causes.
- Systemic change often requires innovation and discovery, and always aspires to enduring, sustainable change.
- Enjoys or will likely enjoy broad support, manifested through the collaboration of multiple community stakeholders, and will magnify awareness of an issue.
- Is either at the scale of the problem it attempts to address or is scalable, replicable or part of a phased approach.
Successful transformational ideas:
- Will have visionary leadership, will be carried out by a capable team working through a strong network of support, will build on a feasible execution plan and will use an approach, whether innovative or well-tested, appropriate to the context.
- Will present an appropriate level of risk.
Every successful project or initiative we've launched in the past has had an abundance of those elements. If you believe your grant opportunity fits, we want to hear from you.
The first step is to contact the appropriate program director for your community or your programmatic interests in journalism. A simple way to find out more about our programs is to visit our web site's Letter of Inquiry section for a self-guided tour.