Moving Forward: Advancing Change and Growing Impact

By Ali Knight, GreenLight Fund CEO

This past year marked an important milestone for the GreenLight Fund: our 20th anniversary. It was a moment to celebrate how far we’ve come – and, just as importantly, to clarify where we are headed.

From our founding site in Boston to today’s presence in 15 metropolitan areas across the country, GreenLight has grown in both reach and impact. Over two decades, we’ve learned what it takes to navigate complexity, adapt through economic and political change, and partner with communities to accelerate progress. Those lessons shape how we lead today and how we plan for the future.

As we reflect on this journey, we also look ahead – with focus and urgency.

What Comes Next

Doing the Next Thing Even Better
At the core of GreenLight’s work is a belief I hold deeply: communities know what they need. Our role is to listen closely, bring forward proven solutions, and help remove the barriers that limit opportunity for far too many children and families.

By pairing local insight with evidence-based, high-impact approaches, we work to address critical unmet needs and confront the economic and racial inequities that persist across our cities. This philosophy – grounded in community voice, rigor, and measurable outcomes – will continue to guide everything we do.

We are committed not just to sustaining this work, but to strengthening it. That means being more responsive to evolving community needs, deepening our presence in long-standing GreenLight cities, and accelerating the flow of effective solutions across our national network to address some of the most complex challenges of our time.

This past year, GreenLight-supported investments reached more than 1.3 million individuals and families, advancing outcomes in food security, housing stability, healthcare access, and financial resilience and others. As we deepen our investments across our 15 sites, we are positioned to unlock broader and deeper impact – serving as anchors of innovation locally while driving scalable change nationally.

Expanding Our Reach
As we strengthen our work in existing sites, we will continue expanding into new cities where GreenLight is needed most. As our track record grows and additional proof points of the GreenLight Effect emerge, so does the demand for GreenLight in new cities.

We will expand thoughtfully – at a pace defined by sustained excellence and guided by community need and opportunity. By 2028, GreenLight will operate in 18 sites nationwide, growing to 20 by 2030. This expansion is central to our strategy to catalyze economic and social mobility at scale, delivering results across diverse communities.

“At Truist Foundation, we invest in proven, community-powered solutions that expand economic mobility for all. GreenLight Fund’s Third National Fund will scale evidence-based innovations to more cities, helping families unlock opportunity and build a brighter future.”  — Lynette Bell, President, Truist Foundation

From Local Transformation to National Impact
What we do drives change in the communities we are in. What we’ve learned can drive change everywhere.

Our growth is driven by a virtuous cycle between local transformation and national impact. GreenLight’s national hub serves as the connective tissue of the network – building the systems, capabilities, and relationships that enable deep, community-led change locally, while ensuring that local learning continually strengthens our national strategy.

We are investing in the platforms and infrastructure that allow us to collaborate at scale: sharing knowledge, forging meaningful connections, and creating opportunities to amplify collective impact.

After 20 years, we bring hard-earned insight into what it takes to scale with integrity – how to engage communities as true partners, identify what works, and advance innovative, scalable approaches to addressing urban poverty and inequities.

“GreenLight’s model of helping communities source proven solutions is one of the breakthrough concepts in philanthropy. With 15 locations and 1.3 million children and families reached last year, GreenLight is on a trajectory to become one of the most important platforms for fighting poverty in this country.” — Jeff Bradach, Co-founder and Former Managing Partner, The Bridgespan Group

While each community’s needs are distinct, our approach is both adaptable and replicable – and our learning is transferable.

A Multiplier for the Future
By deepening investments in existing communities, expanding to new sites, and harnessing the strength of our national network, we will catalyze transformative change. Each effort delivers meaningful impact on its own; together, they create a powerful multiplier effect – accelerating progress in the fight against poverty nationwide.

Looking ahead, we will leverage GreenLight’s growing geographic reach and cross-sector partnerships to confront barriers to economic mobility. We will strengthen regional collaboration, surface and scale what works, and serve as a trusted knowledge and innovation hub for the field. Grounded in community voice and local leadership, we will advance a bold, shared vision for inclusive prosperity.

As we grow, we will hold ourselves accountable by measuring impact across four core dimensions:

Building Bridges That Elevate Impact
For more than two decades, GreenLight has partnered with communities to expand opportunity and improve outcomes for individuals and families experiencing poverty nationwide. We have grown in reach and presence, continuously strengthening a proven, community-driven model. In doing so, we have built a national network that is far greater than the sum of its parts – by forging bridges across diverse stakeholders and leading through moments of profound challenge and change.

In the years ahead, we will continue to lead by building bridges and elevating what works. We will leverage our growth, scale, and learning to help tens of millions of individuals and families climb the ladder of opportunity – by strengthening existing rungs, repairing broken ones, and creating new pathways forward.