The Fledgling Fund supports innovative media projects that can play critical roles in igniting social change. We believe that film and other creative media can bear witness to the challenges faced by vulnerable individuals, families and communities in ways that statistics can not, and that it can create a broader understanding of social problems and inspire concrete action. We also believe that well-structured and creative audience engagement initiatives can leverage media's ability to ignite social change by moving people from awareness to action. We strive for a portfolio of media projects that allows us to:
- Support projects that are timely, tell compelling and important stories, represent a unique perspective or an intriguing solution to an entrenched social problem, and have strong potential as a vehicle for social change.
- Demonstrate how films coupled with well-structured and measurable outreach and audience engagement campaigns can raise awareness about complex social issues, encourage dialogue, share possible solutions, and move people to action.
- Encourage the innovative use of media, such as Web 2.0 strategies, and short form videos, to engage new audiences around important social issues.
We work closely with our partners to advance these objectives.
Featured Creative Media Project
Who Is Dayani Cristal?
Who Is Dayani Cristal? is a groundbreaking fusion of drama and documentary, starring Gael García Bernal, one of the most exciting actors of his generation. Telling the story of one man's epic journey from his home in El Escanito, Honduras,...Our Creative Media Projects
Economic Justice and Systemic Poverty
Who Is Dayani Cristal?
Who Is Dayani Cristal? is a groundbreaking fusion of drama and documentary, starring Gael García Bernal, one of the most...
Utopia In Ethiopia
Despite $3 billion of foreign aid money pouring into Ethiopia every year, the country still remains one of the poorest...
Invisible: Diaries of New York's Homeless Youth
Each year, up to 2.8 million young people experience homelessness. But most homeless youth are "invisible" to Americans--they don't sleep...
Cotton Road
A travelogue for the 21st century, Cotton Road is a documentary about the workers who make possible cotton's global...
Inocente
Inocente is an intensely personal and vibrant coming of age feature documentary about a young artist's fierce determination to never...
A Small Act
Can one small act dramatically change the course of another person's life? Chris Mburu was the top student in his...
Up In Smoke
Up in Smoke follows British scientist Mike Hands, who has laboured for 25 years to perfect a sustainable farming technique...
An Age For Justice
In every community throughout America, there is an epidemic that we have shut our eyes to - an epidemic that...
Connected
Combining powerful visuals, humor, animation, irony, and serious messages, Connected explores the visible and invisible connections between the major issues...
Moving Windmills: The William Kamkwamba Story
In 2001, William Kamkwamba, a young man from a village in Malawi, was forced to drop out of school due...
The Revolutionary Optimists
The Revolutionary Optimists follows Amlan Ganguly, a lawyer-turned social entrepreneur who has made a significant impact in the poorest neighborhoods...
World Without Walls
The United Nations Millennium Campaign is the largest self-empowerment campaign in the history of the world. Its aim: to end...
Music By Prudence
Music By Prudence is the uplifting story of a Zimbabwean singer-songwriter Prudence Mabhena, 21, who was born severely disabled. Her...
Deep Down
Deep Down puts a human face on the consequences of our environmental impact. Any exploration of power production in...
Made in India
Made in India is a feature length documentary film about the human experiences behind the phenomena of "outsourcing" surrogate...
The Silent Partner
In sub-Saharan Africa, home to two-thirds of the world's people living with HIV, women make up 60 percent of those...
Reporter
Journalism, as we know it, is in trouble. In the Internet age, newspapers and magazines face near extinction. Newsrooms are...
Empress Hotel
Empress Hotel is a feature-length documentary film about formerly homeless people in San Francisco. The film contrasts the order of...
Good Fortune
Good Fortune is a feature documentary that explores how massive international efforts to alleviate poverty in Africa may be undermining...
The Greatest Silence: Rape in the Congo
Since 1998 a brutal war has been raging in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Over 4 million people have...Education Experiences
To Be Heard
To Be Heard is a documentary about three young poets from the Bronx who learn to use their own poetry...
American Teacher
American Teacher is the feature-length documentary film created and produced by The Teacher Salary Project. Based on the New York...
Shakespeare High
Shakespeare High is a riveting documentary about a socio-economic cross-section of teens in Southern California that study Shakespeare to compete...A Small Act
Can one small act dramatically change the course of another person's life? Chris Mburu was the top student in his...
The Bully Project
This year, over 18 million American kids will be bullied, making it the most common form of violence young people...
Brooklyn Castle
A squat concrete building on an inner-city block, Intermediate School 318 in Brooklyn, New York may not impress from...
An American Promise
In An American Promise, Brooklyn filmmakers and parents Michèle Stephenson and Joe Brewster turn the camera on themselves and make...
Lunch Love Community
In 1999, The Berkeley Unified School District created it's ground-breaking and influential Food Policy mandating a goal to "provide nutritious,...
Speaking in Tongues
Speaking in Tongues follows the lives of four kids attempting to become bilingual as they study four different languages;...
Two Angry Moms
Amy Kalafa was stewing for years, packing her kids lunches from home and trying to get her community to pay...Environmental Justice
Amazon Gold
Amazon Gold is a 52-minute documentary film that follows photojournalist Ron Haviv and journalist Donovan Webster through the Madre de...
Truck Farm
Truck Farm is art with a message. Called "the coolest urban agriculture project around" by The Huffington Post, it engages...
Burning The Future
Burning the Future was one of the first films to provide a comprehensive view of the problems associated with Mountain...
Living Downstream
Based on the acclaimed book by ecologist and cancer survivor Sandra Steingraber, Ph.D., Living Downstream is an eloquent and award-winning...
The Electron Project
The Electron Project is an innovative engagement platform hosted online and in classrooms that educates people about the real costs...Cotton Road
A travelogue for the 21st century, Cotton Road is a documentary about the workers who make possible cotton's global...Up In Smoke
Up in Smoke follows British scientist Mike Hands, who has laboured for 25 years to perfect a sustainable farming technique...Connected
Combining powerful visuals, humor, animation, irony, and serious messages, Connected explores the visible and invisible connections between the major issues...Moving Windmills: The William Kamkwamba Story
In 2001, William Kamkwamba, a young man from a village in Malawi, was forced to drop out of school due...
Bag It
Bag It follows Jeb Berrier, an average American guy who is admittedly not a "tree hugger," who makes a pledge...
Gasland
The largest domestic natural gas drilling boom in history has swept across the United States. The Halliburton-developed drilling technology of...World Without Walls
The United Nations Millennium Campaign is the largest self-empowerment campaign in the history of the world. Its aim: to end...
Cape Wind
When Jim Gordon first proposed building an offshore wind farm in fabled Nantucket Sound, he had no idea of the...Lunch Love Community
In 1999, The Berkeley Unified School District created it's ground-breaking and influential Food Policy mandating a goal to "provide nutritious,...
Planeat
Planeat is a provocative challenge to our love of meat and dairy. Tracking the work of a group of scientists,...
Turkey Creek
When the historic African American cemetery of Turkey Creek, Mississippi, is bulldozed for commercial development, prodigal son Derrick Evans returns...Deep Down
Deep Down puts a human face on the consequences of our environmental impact. Any exploration of power production in...
IOBY
IOBY connects donors and volunteers to environmental projects in their neighborhoods to inspire new environmental knowledge and action in New...
Dirty Business: The Selling of Clean Coal
Politicians and corporate interests have mounted a formidable public relations campaign promoting 'clean coal' as crucial to solving our energy/climate...
Environmental Witness Network
SkyTruth is harnessing Web 2.0 technology to generate new information and catalyze citizen action on critical environmental justice issues. The...
Split Estate
Imagine discovering that you don't own the mineral rights under your land, and that an energy company plans to drill...
The End of the Line
Imagine an ocean without fish. Imagine your meals without seafood. Imagine the global consequences. This is the future if...
No Impact Man
Global Warming! The headlines scream it; the thermometer confirms it; but few of us do much to address it. Author...Field Building
Firelight Media
Firelight Media's Producers' Lab is a mentorship program for independent diverse producers. Participating producers work with award-winning filmmaker, Stanley Nelson,...
WITNESS Tools And Tactics Initiative
WITNESS uses video to open the eyes of the world to human rights violations. WITNESS' core methodology is "video advocacy"--the...
Voices of Our Future
There is not a single nation in the world where women have an equal voice. Across the globe, the challenges...
NALIP
The Latino Producers Academy (LPA) is a 10-day residential intensive each August that NALIP holds in order to build the...
Media That Matters
Media That Matters is an annual film festival and a collection of short social issue films accompanied by public programs...
Fledgling Fellowship in Documentary Film at The MacDowell Colony
An international arts center based in rural New Hampshire, The MacDowell Colony provides an ideal environment for filmmakers and other...
Rooftop Films Gasland Tour
Rooftop Films is a non-profit organization whose mission is to engage and inspire diverse communities by showing movies in outdoor...Girl's Empowerment and Women's Leadership
Utopia In Ethiopia
Despite $3 billion of foreign aid money pouring into Ethiopia every year, the country still remains one of the poorest...Inocente
Inocente is an intensely personal and vibrant coming of age feature documentary about a young artist's fierce determination to never...
Empty Handed: Responding to the Demand for Contraceptives
Empty Handed tells the story of women's lack of access to reproductive health supplies in sub-Saharan Africa, and its...
Crime After Crime
Crime After Crime is the exclusive documentary film on the legal battle to free Debbie Peagler, a woman imprisoned...
Faded
Girls are getting drunk more. According to the 2008 National Institute of Alcoholism and Addiction (NIAA) Report, alcohol use among...World Without Walls
The United Nations Millennium Campaign is the largest self-empowerment campaign in the history of the world. Its aim: to end...
Budrus
Budrus follows a Palestinian community organizer, Ayed Morrar, who unites local Fatah and Hamas members along with Israeli supporters in...Music By Prudence
Music By Prudence is the uplifting story of a Zimbabwean singer-songwriter Prudence Mabhena, 21, who was born severely disabled. Her...Made in India
Made in India is a feature length documentary film about the human experiences behind the phenomena of "outsourcing" surrogate...
The Beyond Seneca Falls Project
Seneca Falls chronicles the life-changing journey of nine diverse high school girls (and a lone ten-year-old boy) bound for the...
The Line
What happens to women when they express their sexuality? Where is the line of consent? The filmmaker's own "grey...
Made in L.A.
Made in L.A. follows the remarkable story of three Latina immigrants working in Los Angeles garment sweatshops as they embark...The Silent Partner
In sub-Saharan Africa, home to two-thirds of the world's people living with HIV, women make up 60 percent of those...
All of Me
All of Me, a work-in-progress documentary film, follows a group of women who have been friends, and fat, for years....
Sin by Silence
From behind prison walls, Sin By Silence reveals the lives of extraordinary women who advocate for a future free from...
Body Typed
Body Typed is a series of four short films that deal with body image and self esteem, including Wet Dreams...
Lioness
Lioness is a documentary film about Army support soldiers who became the first women in American history to be sent...The Greatest Silence: Rape in the Congo
Since 1998 a brutal war has been raging in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Over 4 million people have...
Very Young Girls
Very Young Girls is a documentary film that chronicles the journey of young women through the underground world of sexual...
Orgasm, Inc.
Orgasm, Inc. is a documentary film that provides a humorous and sobering look inside "big pharma" and the marketing campaigns...Health and Wellness
Truck Farm
Truck Farm is art with a message. Called "the coolest urban agriculture project around" by The Huffington Post, it engages...Living Downstream
Based on the acclaimed book by ecologist and cancer survivor Sandra Steingraber, Ph.D., Living Downstream is an eloquent and award-winning...Empty Handed: Responding to the Demand for Contraceptives
Empty Handed tells the story of women's lack of access to reproductive health supplies in sub-Saharan Africa, and its...
AXSmap
AXSmap is inspired by Jason DaSilva's love for roaming the streets of New York City. Four short years ago,...An Age For Justice
In every community throughout America, there is an epidemic that we have shut our eyes to - an epidemic that...
The Waiting Room
The Waiting Room is a hyper-local media project that allows people passing through the waiting rooms of California's public hospitals...Connected
Combining powerful visuals, humor, animation, irony, and serious messages, Connected explores the visible and invisible connections between the major issues...Faded
Girls are getting drunk more. According to the 2008 National Institute of Alcoholism and Addiction (NIAA) Report, alcohol use among...Gasland
The largest domestic natural gas drilling boom in history has swept across the United States. The Halliburton-developed drilling technology of...World Without Walls
The United Nations Millennium Campaign is the largest self-empowerment campaign in the history of the world. Its aim: to end...Lunch Love Community
In 1999, The Berkeley Unified School District created it's ground-breaking and influential Food Policy mandating a goal to "provide nutritious,...Music By Prudence
Music By Prudence is the uplifting story of a Zimbabwean singer-songwriter Prudence Mabhena, 21, who was born severely disabled. Her...
Shooting Beauty
Shooting Beauty is a documentary film about an aspiring fashion photographer named Courtney Bent who, in 1997 with no formal...Planeat
Planeat is a provocative challenge to our love of meat and dairy. Tracking the work of a group of scientists,...Made in India
Made in India is a feature length documentary film about the human experiences behind the phenomena of "outsourcing" surrogate...
Monica and David
Monica and David explores the marriage of two adults with Down syndrome and the family who strives to support their...The Line
What happens to women when they express their sexuality? Where is the line of consent? The filmmaker's own "grey...Two Angry Moms
Amy Kalafa was stewing for years, packing her kids lunches from home and trying to get her community to pay...The Silent Partner
In sub-Saharan Africa, home to two-thirds of the world's people living with HIV, women make up 60 percent of those...All of Me
All of Me, a work-in-progress documentary film, follows a group of women who have been friends, and fat, for years....Body Typed
Body Typed is a series of four short films that deal with body image and self esteem, including Wet Dreams...
About Face: The Story of Gwendellin Bradshaw
On a chilly Alaskan summer night in 1980, a family camping trip turned into a tragedy when 10-month old Gwendellin...Orgasm, Inc.
Orgasm, Inc. is a documentary film that provides a humorous and sobering look inside "big pharma" and the marketing campaigns...Justice System
The Interrupters
The Interrupters tells the moving and surprising stories of three Violence Interrupters who try to protect their Chicago communities from...Who Is Dayani Cristal?
Who Is Dayani Cristal? is a groundbreaking fusion of drama and documentary, starring Gael García Bernal, one of the most...
Mississippi Innocence
The Mississippi Innocence Project is committed to providing the highest quality legal representation to its clients: Mississippi state prisoners serving...
Cuéntame
Cuéntame is an interactive online community where Latinos and the general public can connect and engage with fellow Facebook fans,...Crime After Crime
Crime After Crime is the exclusive documentary film on the legal battle to free Debbie Peagler, a woman imprisoned...
Give Up Tomorrow
After languishing for 12 years on death row in a Philippine prison, Paco Larranaga finds hope when the international human...
No Tomorrow
No Tomorrow investigates the murder of Risa Bejarano, the principle subject in the filmmakers earlier film, Aging Out, about teenagers...
Mothers of Bedford
Eighty percent of women in prison are mothers of school age children. Mothers of Bedford looks at the lives of...
Burned: Life In Texas' Youth Prisons
Burned follows a year in the lives of two boys incarcerated in Texas' scandal-plagued juvenile justice system. Though his original...
Enemy Alien
Enemy Alien, a first-person documentary, offers a dramatic inside view of the fight to free Farouk Abdel-Muhti, a gentle but...
The Dhamma Brothers
East meets West in the Deep South. An overcrowded maximum-security prison--the end of the line in Alabama's correctional system--is dramatically...
In The Balance
In The Balance is a multi-platform project that seeks to create a learning space that effectively responds to the "school-to-prison...Sin by Silence
From behind prison walls, Sin By Silence reveals the lives of extraordinary women who advocate for a future free from...Very Young Girls
Very Young Girls is a documentary film that chronicles the journey of young women through the underground world of sexual...Past Projects
Promised Land
Promised Land examines post-apartheid South Africa's efforts to bring about racial reconciliation through land distribution. The film follows two black...
A Sea Change
Imagine a world without fish. It's a frightening premise, and it's happening right now. A Sea Change follows the journey...
Under Our Skin
In the early 1970's, a mysterious ailment was discovered among children living around the town of Lyme, CT. What was...
Trouble the Water
Trouble the Water takes you inside Hurricane Katrina in a way never before seen on screen. It's a redemptive tale...
What's on Your Plate?
What's on Your Plate? is a witty and provocative documentary produced and directed by award-winning Catherine Gund about kids and...
In the Family
At 31, filmmaker Joanna Rudnick faces an impossible decision: remove her breasts and ovaries or risk incredible odds of developing...
The Greening of Southie
What happens when you're asked to build the city of tomorrow... today? Set on the storied streets of South Boston,...
10 Americans
Prominent, current studies link many government-approved but clinically-untested chemicals in everyday products to miscarriages, birth defects, reproductive malfunction, cancer, and...
La Americana
La Americana is an intimate documentary following an undocumented immigrant's journey from Bolivia to New York City and back, as...
Going on 13
From Tweety Bird to Bow Wow, double dutch to chat rooms, Daddy's girls to first deceptions, watch as Ariana, Isha,...
Rachel Is
In her feature directorial debut, Charlotte Glynn moves home to chronicle her sister Rachel's last year in school. Rachel, her...
Firestorm
Every minute in the United States, an ambulance gets turned away from an emergency room because hospitals are simply too...
Kick Like a Girl
Kick Like A Girl is a feature documentary about the story of what happens when "The Mighty Cheetahs," an undefeated...
War Dance
War Dance is a feature-length documentary that tells the story of three children from the Patongo displacement camp in northern...
Beyond Belief
Beyond Belief is a documentary film about the connection women find in the face of tragedy. Susan Retik and Patti...
The Accidental Advocate
The Accidental Advocate is a documentary film that expores the intersection of politics, science and health care. When Claude Gerstle,...
Body and Soul: Diana and Kathy
Body and Soul: Diana and Kathy is a documentary that follows the story of two friends who have become advocates...
Critical Condition
Critical Condition, a feature documentary by Roger Weisberg, paints a disturbing and gripping portrait of what happens when you're sick...
Kings Park
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King Corn
King Corn is a feature documentary about one acre of corn and its journey into the American food system. The...
Everything's Cool
Everything's Cool is a documentary film that is a "toxic comedy" about the most dangerous chasm ever to emerge between...
Children in No Man's Land
Children In No Man's Land is a documentary that uncovers the current plight of the 100,000 unaccompanied minors entering the...
The Devil Came on Horseback
The Devil Came on Horseback is a documentary film that exposes the violence and tragedy of the genocide in Darfur,...
LightBox: Expressions of Hope from Young Women in the Kibera Slum of Nairobi
LightBox is a 132 page, full-color, hardcover coffee table book, comprised of photographs and essays by the teenage members of...
Ghosts of Abu Ghraib
Ghosts of Abu Ghraib is a documentary film that examines and contextualizes the abuses that occurred in the fall of...
Freeheld
Detective Lieutenant Laurel Hester spent 25 years investigating tough cases in Ocean County, New Jersey, protecting the rights of victims...
A Walk to Beautiful
A Walk to Beautiful is a feature length documentary that tells the stories of five Ethiopian women, who suffer from...Special Projects
The Truth Will Set You Free
The Truth Will Set You Free begins with the story of a man whose two defining passions are in conflict:...
Shelbyville Multimedia
Inspired by the residents of Shelbyville, Tennessee, who pushed past their fears and faced the rapid demographic change in their...
Tony and Janina's American Wedding
This feature length documentary gets to the heart of the broken, red tape ridden U.S. immigration system. After 18 years...
No Dumb Questions Website
"If they know us, they don't vote against us" - Harvey Milk What are you wondering about lesbian, gay, bisexual,...
The Reckoning for Teachers
Three short film gems for use in classroom and community settings that explore the ideas and issues about international justice...
The Harvest
The Harvest Game, an online companion to Shine Global's upcoming documentary The Harvest, provides the player with the experience of...
The Youth and Gender Media Project
The Youth & Gender Media Project encompasses three short films that capture the diversity and complexity of gender nonconforming youth....
The Recruiter
The Recruiter is a cinéma-vérité, feature-length documentary that travels to the Louisiana coast to present Sergeant First Class Clay Usie,...
Out In The Silence
Out In The Silence captures the remarkable chain of events that unfold when the announcement of filmmaker Joe Wilson's wedding...
Freedom Riders
Freedom Riders is a powerful, harrowing and ultimately inspirational story of six months in 1961 that changed America forever. From...
Mosque in Morgantown
Working in Pakistan after September 11, 2001, former reporter Wall Street Journal Asra Normani had faced a double shock. First...
Priority 2
Priority 2 is a call for American politicians and policy makers to remember our moral obligations to the people whose...