This year, for the third year in a row, we conducted 2 rounds of review for proposals from all over the world. Most were originally submitted to foundations or major grant competitions, but we also reviewed USAID proposals, business plans, one-pagers, and concept notes.

The Unfunded List identifies and promotes great social change ideas that have not yet secured funding using a rigorous proposal evaluation process. All proposals submitted receive helpful feedback, but only those earning the highest evaluations make the twice annual Unfunded List.

2019

We received 50 proposals to review during the Spring, which was a record for us until our Fall Review topped it. To ensure we could provide helpful and candid feedback to each submission, we onboarded 100 new evaluators, bringing the total number of evaluators on our committee to over 300. Over the Summer and Fall we would recruit an additional 100 evaluators to end the year with over 400 in our database.

This Fall, we reviewed 88 proposals. We delivered thousands of pages of personalized feedback from our evaluation committee and also included standard feedback on targeting foundations from our friends at CANDID, plus tips for crowdfunding supplied by Kickstarter. The round was particularly large because of our partnership with the SOLVE Challenge at MIT.

MIT SOLVE

The partnership with MIT was exciting and took us from MIT’s campus on the banks of the Charles River to the halls of the United Nations during General Assembly week (UNGA). Most of the time though, we spent quietly and independently reviewing the 60 finalists from MIT’s innovation social change competition. 32 of the Finalists were selected as SOLVERs and so, in true Unfunded List fashion, we are pleased to give an honorable mention to some of their non-selected finalist organizations.

These non-selected proposals were among the 60 finalists chosen out of 4400 submissions to travel to New York City to pitch, but were ultimately not selected by the SOLVE judges who had difficult decisions to make. The day after the pitch competition, we met with many of these folks personally, having read their proposals and all of the feedback they received. We are confident that these proposals will be improved and that their future efforts will have great success and impact.

Click here to read our post about the partnership and learn about some of the non-selected finalists from this year’s SOLVE competition.

You can also learn about the SOLVE winners here.

"The" 2019 Unfunded List

We will continue to provide free review to programs that have submitted previously. To encourage repeat submissions and celebrate the hard work done by the unfunded we have come to know best, this Spring we recognized 4 programs that have each made multiple submissions to our program.

Your proposal or idea could be featured on our official List if you submit it to Unfunded List for feedback from our Evaluation Committee. You will receive feedback and advice that can help your organization or mission, and have the possibility of being featured on our official List of underfunded ideas that deserve attention and recognition.

You can also join our Evaluation Committee to give feedback and advice to other proposals and hone your skills and knowledge of the philanthropy world in our Library of Philanthropy Education.

AsylumConnect

AsylumConnect is a comprehensive digital lifeline for persecuted LGBTQ people. Their mission is to provide persecuted & marginalized LGBTQ people with verified information and access community they need to live freely. They were also honored on our 2018 Unfunded List.

Read Their Proposal

National Medical Fellowships

National Medical Fellowships’ mission is to provide scholarships and support for underrepresented minority students in medicine and the health professions.

Read Their Proposal

DC Scores

DC SCORES is the flagship of national nonprofit America SCORES, which serves 10,000 students annually at more than 175 public and charter schools in 12 major cities.

Read Their Proposal

Respectability

Respectability is an organization that supports the differently abled by fighting stigma, educating leaders and advancing opportunities for people with disabilities.

Read Their Proposal