Audacious Project executive director Anna Verghese and head of TED Chris Anderson onstage at TED2019 in Vancouver, BC, Canada. The 2021-22 cohort features nine audacious responses to some of the world’s biggest challenges. (Photo: Dian Lofton / TED)

Communities around the globe are grappling with division and uncertainty. Lasting and transformative change on the world’s most pressing challenges will require us to work together and find common ground. At The Audacious Project, we aspire to be a lever for courageous collaboration, supporting those who are reimagining and rebuilding our systems to better meet the demands of this moment. 

This past year, the Audacious community has come together to catalyze more than $900 million for nine bold projects. Sourced from our global network, and supported by our team over the past 12 months, these projects hope to create clear pathways to a better future.

The 2021-22 Audacious Project grantees are: 

• Code for America: Harnessing technology to transform the US social safety net
• Center for Tech and Civic Life: Strengthening local election administration in the US
• ClimateWorks: Drive Electric: Accelerating the end of the polluting tailpipe and transition to clean transportation
• Glasswing International: Building critical mental health support in Central America’s Northern Triangle
• The International Refugee Assistance Project: Unlocking legal rights so that refugees can resettle safely
• myAgro: Equipping smallholder farmers with the power to invest in themselves 
• Noora Health: Training family caregivers to help their loved ones heal
• The Tenure Facility: Securing land for Indigenous peoples — for justice and our climate
• Woodwell Climate Research Center: Integrating permafrost into our global solution for climate change

These projects reflect continued collaboration between a group of global partners, philanthropic organizations and determined individuals who believe in the power of pooling significant, long-term resources in service of impact. Our hope is that this inspires others to engage in the work too.

This new cohort joins an existing Audacious portfolio of 29 projects, with over $3.1 billion of philanthropic dollars catalyzed since 2015. Four cycles into this program, the Audacious projects together reveal a powerful truth: the problems we face are not intractable, and the status quo is not inevitable.

We look forward to sharing these new projects with you next week at TED2022 during the Audacious session co-hosted by Academy Award nominee and Emmy, BAFTA and Peabody Award winner Ava DuVernay, and we very much hope you’ll join us in supporting and amplifying their work far and wide. 

With gratitude and determined hope,
Anna Verghese, executive director of The Audacious Project
Chris Anderson, head of TED