Eligibility and Selection Criteria

Nominations are now closed. Register for email updates to receive news about finalists and the Prize winner.

To be eligible, a collaboration must:

Be permanent or designed to operate for an indefinite period of time
Involve two or more nonprofit organizations that each would otherwise provide the same or similar programs or services and compete for clients, financial resources and staff
Have a structure that is evidenced by a formal agreement that uses the resources of each party in a more effective way; this agreement could be a memorandum of understanding (MOU), a letter of agreement, a contract, or a merger agreement
Have begun operation at least 18 months prior to nomination and must have been in existence no longer than eight years prior to the date of nomination (refers to the collaboration, not the individual organizations)

For the purposes of the Prize, collaboration means joint programming, administrative consolidations, or mergers among two or more organizations that would otherwise compete.

The collaboration or each participant must be:

Registered as a 501(c)(3) organization
Located and conduct work in the United States
In good standing with all regulatory authorities

A complete nomination package must include the following:

Nominee qualifications form
IRS determination letter(s) for the collaboration or for each organization involved in the collaboration
Documentation of the collaboration structure (letter of agreement, memorandum of understanding, contract, or merger agreement)
Nominator information form
Nominee contact information form
Letter of nomination

Each collaboration will be judged on the extent to which it:

Demonstrates significant impact (i.e., achieves exceptional community benefit) through quantifiable means and/or qualitative evidence
Represents an innovative response to a specific challenge or opportunity, better positions the collaboration as a field/sector leader, or more effectively uses human and financial resources