About Us

Partners For Developing Futures ("Partners") is a nonprofit social venture investment fund that primarily invests in high-potential, early-stage minority-led charter schools and charter school networks that educate underserved students.

Partners' mission is to efficiently attract, identify, and support talented leaders of color in creating and growing high-quality charter schools and charter school networks. Partners is designed to promote and facilitate executive-level leadership and entrepreneurship among people of color, particularly as charter school founders, Chief Executive Officers, Executive Directors, and/or board members who are committed to academic success and see the development and operation of charter schools as a way of providing superior public education to youth in their community who might not otherwise receive a quality education.

Our Fund creates a “longer runway” for minority-led charter schools and networks to take off towards achieving outstanding results and financial sustainability. Partners invests in new charter schools and charter school networks that are still in planning and young charter schools that are less than four years old, and support them through a continuum of financial support and technical assistance. This includes the funding often needed during the planning and development stages of a new charter school and the school’s first few years as it grows to full enrollment, as well as ongoing support and development for funded leaders. The graphic below illustrates the multiple stages in which Partners is designed to support entrepreneurs of color in developing and operating charter schools. By providing needed seed capital and strategic support early in the organization's development, our vision is to dramatically increase the number of high-quality charter schools and networks led by people of color and serve as a launching pad for the next generation of leaders of high-performing charter schools and charter school networks.

We believe that leaders of color who build and run exemplary charter schools serve as important change agents in both their local community and the charter school movement nationally. In addition to creating more quality educational options, entrepreneurs of color play a significant role in empowering minority and low-income families in underserved communities and engaging them in educational decisions that affect their children. As the charter school movement continues to grow nationally, it imperative that more leaders of color are involved developing and running quality charter schools as part of the education reform initiatives that affect their communities and the underserved youth who live in them.