Programs

The Skoll Foundation presents the Skoll Awards for Social Entrepreneurship each year to a select group of social entrepreneurs whose innovations have already had significant, proven impact on some of the world’s most pressing problems, and invests directly in the promise of even greater impact at scale. By investing in organizations when an innovation is ripe for accelerated and scaled adoption, the Skoll Awards help unleash the full global potential and reach of social entrepreneurs.

Each Awardee receives a $1.5 million, three-year core support investment to scale their work and increase their impact. They also gain leverage through their long-term participation in a global community of visionary leaders and innovators dedicated to solving the world’s most pressing problems.

We select Awardees that focus on one or more of the following issues: Environmental Sustainability, Education, Economic Opportunity, Health, Peace and Human Rights, and Sustainable Markets.

Partnerships are critical for scaling effective innovations to affect large-scale change. The Skoll Foundation partners with aligned institutions across all sectors that share a passion for driving change on the critical issues of our time. Partners bring a wealth of capabilities to bear—from storytelling, funding and strategy, to sourcing and support of innovators globally. By aligning our assets and capabilities, we invest in a collective effort that can lead to sustainable systems change—impossible had we gone it alone.

In 2003, we partnered with the Saïd Business School at the University of Oxford to launch the first academic center dedicated to social entrepreneurship, the Skoll Centre for Social Entrepreneurship. We also support and partner with many pioneers and innovators in the field, organizations such as Ashoka, Acumen Fund, and Duke University’s Center for the Advancement of Social Entrepreneurship.

We also amplify the stories of social entrepreneurs through partnerships with leading film, broadcast, and other social impact organizations such as the PBS NewsHour, the Sundance Institute, TED, and the Social Progress Imperative to help drive public awareness of social entrepreneurship and its potential to address the critical issues of our time.

Each year, more than 1,400 distinguished delegates from the social, finance, private, and public sectors convene in Oxford for a week of learning and connection. There, they can explore the latest models for change across a range of issues and engage with leading thinkers and doers on critical questions, challenges, and opportunities in global systems change.

The Skoll World Forum is co-produced with the Skoll Centre for Social Entrepreneurship at the Saïd Business School, Oxford University. The Forum is typically in-person and invitation only, with new delegates identified by our extensive referral network. In 2020, the Forum moved online as the coronavirus pandemic made it impossible for us to convene in Oxford. Stay up-to-date on the Forum’s location and registration process by checking our Frequently Asked Questions and signing up for our newsletter at skoll.org/newsletter.