MacArthur Foundation launches ‘100&Change’ competition for single $100 million grant

MacArthur is launching 100&Change, our competition for a single $100 million grant to help solve one of the world’s most critical social challenges. 100&Change remains open to organisations and collaborations working in any field, anywhere, that identify a problem and offer a solution. Proposals must identify a problem and offer a solution that promises significant and durable change; they will be accepted online only from 30 April to 6 August 2019. Building on the first-round success of 100&Change, MacArthur is creating Lever for Change, a new nonprofit committed to unlocking philanthropic capital and helping donors put their resources to work to accelerate social change.

In the inaugural round of 100&Change, from 1,904 proposals submitted, Sesame Workshop and International Rescue Committee were awarded $100 million to educate young children displaced by conflict and persecution in the Syrian response region and to challenge the global system of humanitarian aid to focus more on building a foundation for future success for millions of young children. Other funders and philanthropists have committed an additional $254 million to date to support bold solutions by 100&Change applicants, including a $100 million LEGO Foundation grant to Sesame Workshop and $9 million in funding from USAID and GHR Foundation to Catholic Relief Services. Many 100&Change applicants found that the competition challenged them to be more ambitious in their thinking, facilitated collaboration among groups to tackle an issue at a broader scale, and enabled them to create proposals they could use to pursue other funding.