In the span of a few minutes at West 4th St., a few things happen: Kids on scooters slide into the back of an old stall, pretending to sell Newports as a B train rumbles by. A passerby stops to scoop up a stray quarter. And a commuter decked out in Knicks gear, holding confetti straight from the team’s ticker-tape parade, shouts, “I miss using newsstands!” as they rush to make their transfer.

In the 1990s, this could’ve been any street corner or subway platform in New York City (except maybe not, since the Knicks hadn’t won a championship since 1973). But today, anything could happen: The Knicks finally won, and a long-vacant newsstand on the downtown BDFM platform is coming back to life.

Al Mullen is a full-time writer and a comedian, too — but outside of those careers, he somehow finds the time to produce Public Transport Mag, a free zine filled with funny anecdotes and cartoons. He prints and staples it together himself and leaves it in train cars and stations (and even the Staten Island ferry) for commuters to serendipitously discover. But now, Al has an even bigger idea: Bring that comedic spirit to a vacant newsstand. Alongside his free zines (and our free newspaper, like the one you’re reading now), the stand will become a fun, free third space at one of the city’s busiest transfer points.

The David Prize first crossed paths with Al when Executive Director Erika Augustine came across his work online. She reached out, eager to buy a magazine branded shirt, and Al ended up applying for the Prize. He didn’t win, but he did later pitch his newsstand idea. What followed was countless meetings, securing a space with the MTA’s Vacant Unit Activation Program, and a partnership with David Prize finalist Barbara Anderson of Art on The Avenue, who activates empty New York spaces with public art. (Her latest work is at the 81st Street Museum of Natural History station, featuring a transformed musical space for local buskers.) After nearly a year, Al secured the keys.

Al had never resurrected an MTA relic before and had no idea what to expect when he rolled up the gate that had likely been closed for at least half a decade. (It’s unclear exactly how long the stand sat vacant, although the magazines left behind featured a pregnant Julia Roberts and Scott Disick trying to win back Kourtney Kardashian, both in 2016.) To his surprise, there were no rats – just an empty stand where Advil, candy, and physical media were once sold, a Coca-Cola refrigerator, and a peculiar black tar and dust kicked up by the trains barreling by. With volunteer friends (including cleaning help from Art on the Ave’s Barbara), durable wipes, and a lot of determination, Al managed to get the space ready for the public.

The newsstand kept its bones, but added a whimsical new skin. Wrapped in a mural vinyl made by artist Edward Steed and installed with the help of blow torches, it’s now home to funny station guides (eventually for all 472 MTA subway stations), trading cards of operating conductors, train aura photos featuring the colors of various train lines, and more. Puppet shows will take place out the side window, and around 9 a.m., comics will do crowd work — commuter comedy — for New Yorkers on their way to work.

Al looks forward the most to the project’s evolution — taking swings that don’t work, then growing and learning from them. He hopes that anyone walking by — a doorman, restaurant worker, an artist or tourist — will always be able to stumble into a few minutes of joyful absurdity on their way to their destination. The David Prize is along for the ride.

🍕 New York Happenings + Opportunities

• A.I. is impacting the workforce, but so are visionaries like Colby King. Read about how 2026 winner Colby is helping queer NYC youth in the Kiki Ballroom scene find meaningful career opportunities through the Kiki Arts Collaborative.

• Hip Hop can help your mental health. Our Executive Director Erika and 2024 winner J.C. Hall were recently featured in a PIX11’s Monica Morales Makes It Happen segment, discussing the Prize and how J.C. uses Hip Hop therapy to provide a safe space for his students at the Mott Haven Community High School in the South Bronx.

• Brooklyn-based businesses! The Social Justice Fund’s Brooklyn Pitch Competition is currently taking applications (until September 4) to help local businesses access the growth capital, strategic support, and connections they need to scale. This will award a total of $450,000 in unrestricted grant funding across selected businesses.

• Our July giveaway winner is Mika Kauffman! Mika is the Co-founding Artistic Director of the Trans Entertainment Guild, an organization bettering the working conditions and lives of trans and gender expansive entertainment workers. They recently created TAP NYC, an emergency grant fund for trans artists and practitioners in the city. Want in on this month’s $250 giveaway? Nominate yourself or a New Yorker you know making real impact in the city on our Instagram.

✏️ New York Cartoon Corner

This month’s cartoon comes from cartoonist, writer and animator, Sofia Warren!

WAIT! Want to submit to next month’s cartoon corner? You can do so HERE. We pay $750 for each cartoon accepted for publication in our newsletter.

In 2017, Jhody Polk boarded a plane for the first time in her life. At 33 years old, she left her hometown in Florida and headed over 1,000 miles north to New York City — answering a call that had always lived inside her.

“I felt it in my bones that New York was big enough to house me and my dreams,” she recalls. “I swear when I got off that plane and got in my Lyft driving through the city, I immediately understood within me that I hadn’t chosen this dream, but life and God had chosen me. I was exactly where I needed to be.”

Jhody’s journey to that moment was anything but ordinary. She learned the law not through school, but in prison. While serving an eight-year sentence in Florida, she walked into the law library and into a world that would reshape her life. There, she met jailhouse lawyers: self-taught incarcerated individuals, many serving life sentences, who helped others navigate the justice system.

For Jhody, it wasn’t just an introduction — it was a calling. Legal concepts came naturally to her. She began studying to understand her own case and help others understand theirs.

By the time she stepped foot in New York for a convening hosted by the National Council for Incarcerated and Formerly Incarcerated Women and Girls, Jhody had been home for three years, navigating the complexities of reintegration. She didn’t yet have the language to describe her work, but over time, she found it. In 2019, she discovered the legal empowerment movement that encourages everyday people to learn, use, and shape the laws that affect their lives.

There she found the same kind of community she’d had with jailhouse lawyers in prison. These experiences, paired with her training in participatory defense, planted the seeds for what would become the Legal Empowerment and Advocacy Hub (LEAH). Its flagship project, the Jailhouse Lawyer Initiative (JLI), is now housed at NYU School of Law through the Bernstein Institute. JLI supports legal education inside prisons and empowers incarcerated people to return those skills to their communities.

“I recognized that the first step to shaping the law is knowing it,” Jhody says. “The legal empowerment cycle says you have to know the law to use it, and you have to use it to shape it.”

Today, a decade after her release, Jhody calls New York City home. She’s emerged as one of the country’s leading voices in the legal empowerment movement and is one of this year’s five David Prize winners. Her vision? To expand access to the law not just for incarcerated people, but for all New Yorkers.

Growing up in Gainesville, Florida, Jhody always had a natural curiosity and knack for learning. She found refuge in the library and thought of becoming a teacher when she’d grow older.

But school was challenging. It wasn’t that she was incapable. Rather, she struggled to co-exist between two starkly different worlds: the isolated Black neighborhood she came from and the wealthier, white environment she was bused into for school.

By the time she reached her teens, her parents had divorced and she became more focused on fitting in with her peers. Her mother was working nights and Jhody, the oldest and only daughter, was expected to hold the household down. She remembers the moment she stopped seeing herself through her own eyes and began seeing herself through the lens of others.

“I stood in the mirror and thought, ‘I don’t want to be you.’ Because I couldn’t fit into the pretty girl mold, I became the tough girl.”

At 23 years old, shortly after giving birth to her second child, Jhody was convicted on several felony charges, stemming from acts committed while she was under the influence and trying to raise bail money for her child’s father.

“My mindset at the time that I committed the crimes was love,” she said. “My daughter’s father, a guy that I wanted so badly to love me, needed me, and I was willing to do whatever it took to get him out.”

Jhody always felt like she was on two paths – “make it out of the hood or triumph the hood” – and this was a turning point. She felt like she was fated to be the “tough, hard queen of the city” after the experience. But prison held unexpected revelations. “I didn’t find criminals and hard, born killers in prison,” Jhody says. “Women were artists, poets, mothers. They were healed. They loved each other and it was the first time I ever had a healthy relationship with women in my life.”

The first time Jhody encountered the law library came at Lowell Correctional Institution, the largest women’s prison in the country. It was the first time she’d ever hear words like ‘beggar’s motion,’ or ‘judge’s discretion.’ She was captivated by the jailhouse lawyers. “They might have the same uniform everyone else was wearing, but they shined,” Jhody says.

A year later, she became a law library secretary at Gadsden Correctional Institution, eventually completing her training to become a certified law clerk. Her specialty was breaking down complex legal problems in a way her peers could understand, helping cases from child custody battles to challenging illegal sentences.

Before prison, Jhody only understood the law as a tool of punishment. Inside, she discovered its potential to protect. “While learning the law I understood that had myself and others had this knowledge earlier, it could have prevented our incarceration all together,” Jhody says.

By the time she was released, she had shed her old identity. She was eager to become a lawyer, but her homecoming wasn’t entirely what she was expecting.

“Within six months, I’ll never forget feeling like I want to go back to prison,” she said. “It took me a long time to understand that it wasn’t that prison was better, but prison was easier.” What she missed wasn’t the confinement, it was the community. Eventually, she found it again on the outside — first through activism in Florida, helping to restore voting rights to formerly incarcerated people, and then through that pivotal trip to New York.

In 2018, Jhody was named a Soros Justice Fellow, and JLI was born out of that fellowship. The initiative has worked to give jailhouse lawyers visibility and centers them as vital parts of the legal ecosystem, offering them legal education, training, and support that is often out of reach.

Initially, Jhody envisioned partnerships with law schools to bridge the gap between legal academia and incarcerated legal workers. She quickly learned that law schools don’t always adequately teach future lawyers about the social and emotional needs of the communities they serve.

“I never imagined this ripple effect of how it would affect our future lawyers,” Jhody says. “They’re taking legal empowerment and the lived experience that they get from organizing with our incarcerated members back to their communities and their legal profession.”

With these newly formed connections JLI created its own education model. It has a national curriculum built by jailhouse lawyers, law students, attorneys, judges, and formerly incarcerated people. The collaboration would lead to 11 national legal education modules that teach what the law is, how to use it and how to shape it.

Today, JLI has a network of over 1,200 connected jailhouse lawyer members across the country. Hundreds of them write letters of thanks to JLI for their work. One of its projects “Flashlights” is a digital archive series that showcases some of their illuminating stories and personal reflections from prison.

Jhody’s work spans more than just supporting legal literacy in prisons. JLI helped recruit nine other global organizations doing legal empowerment work in prisons to help launch the International Incarcerated Paralegal Congress to be a formalized working body for incarcerated people.

After struggling to find a law office willing to use her skill set, Jhody started Florida’s first participatory defense hub for her and others to be able to give their legal knowledge to their community. In partnership with public defenders and students from University of Florida Levin College of Law, the model was set up for community members and public defenders to become organizers of the law.

While juggling countless responsibilities, Jhody has earned an associate degree in paralegal studies. She is now completing an advanced paralegal bachelor’s degree at CUNY. Jhody is building a path for professionals like herself — those who don’t work in law offices or hold law degrees — to meaningfully serve their communities. She’s working to create an accredited community paralegal program designed to provide certification for those looking to formalize their training and return their skills back into their communities.

After launching the first LEAH hub in Florida, Jhody is now setting her sights on New York City. Her vision is to establish community paralegal spaces in all five boroughs, where trained advocates help address the everyday legal needs of their neighborhoods. From teaching herself the law in prison libraries to partnering with law schools across the country, Jhody’s journey is one of profound transformation — not just for herself, but for the communities she uplifts. She firmly believes that the law belongs to the people. Through her work, she’s ensuring they have the tools and confidence to access it.

While her list of accolades and awards is extensive, it’s her role as a trusted presence within her own community that brings her the deepest sense of fulfillment.

“Out of all the stuff on my resume, it’s being a community member that is my greatest title,” she says.

Where she once felt caught between two worlds, Jhody now walks confidently in her wholeness—an embodiment of all the layers of her identity.

“I’m a real Black woman from the streets, and I made it here. I didn’t give up my culture, I didn’t give up my identity to be here,” she says. “I’m fully Jhody Polk.”

🍕 New York Happenings + Opportunities

• 2025 winner Mi Jong Lee took the stage at the UN recently. Speaking on a panel for Micro, Small, and Medium-sized Enterprises Day, she highlighted her work bringing manufacturing back to Manhattan’s Garment District. (Listen here, starting around 2:07.)

• Join 2024 Prize finalist Asad Dandia on a walking tour experience to learn about the untold history of NYPD, in partnership with Empire City.

• Did you know 2023 finalist Qween Jean made history becoming the first openly Trans person to win a Tony? We are so beyond proud of her.

• Calling on Brooklyn-based businesses! The Social Justice Fund’s Brooklyn Pitch Competition helps local businesses access the growth capital, strategic support, and connections they need to scale. This will award a total of $450,000 in unrestricted grant funding across selected businesses. Apply by September 4.

• Our June giveaway winner was Daphne Frias! In her nomination, @Kamstagrams explained, “Daphne is fighting for a climate resilient future for ALL New Yorkers, specifically BIPOC and disabled neighbors living in poverty.” Want in on this month’s $250 giveaway? Nominate yourself or a New Yorker you know making real impact in the city on our Instagram.

✏️ New York Cartoon Corner

This month’s fun cartoon comes from Anjali Chandrashekar!

Psssst. Want to submit to next month’s cartoon corner? You can do so HERE. We pay $750 for each cartoon accepted for publication in our newsletter.

Amidst it all are celebrations across the city for Pride, Juneteenth, Puerto Rican heritage and even the World Cup. That’s the magic of this city. It doesn't give you one big moment. It gives you all of them, all at once. We love you New York. And we love you, New York Knickerbockers!

🍕New York Happenings

• 2024 Winner J.C. Hall is reimagining mental health care through hip-hop. For Forbes, Afdhel Aziz wrote about the Hip Hop Therapy program he’s run for over a decade at Mott Haven Community High School.

• Meet 'The Bull' from the subway ads. 's Anne Kadet sits down with Michael Lamonsoff, the personal injury lawyer behind the gloriously insane ad we all stare at every time it’s on our commute.

• The David Prize 2024 Artist in Residence Millie von Platen illustrated Knicks superfans' wildest superstitions for The New Yorker. From taking a dog's ashes courtside to rubbing a jar of nut butter, Millie captured all the ways New Yorkers held out hope through a historic title run.

• Step inside the Harlem home of Marcella Lowery, the 'Mayor of 116th Street' and Cosby Show actress who's spent nearly 40 years organizing for tenants' rights.

• 2022 Winner David Shalleck-Klein has filed another class action lawsuit against ACS over family separation, challenging the city's practice of taking children from their parents through emergency removals, often without a judge's approval first.

💸 Meet Our May Giveaway Winner

Our May giveaway winner is George Espinal, founder and president of Verde Vida. Growing up, George cherished memories of his grandmother’s garden in Brooklyn; an experience that would later inspire his mission to fight food insecurity across New York City.

Today, Verde Vida serves communities in Washington Heights, Inwood, and the Bronx by rescuing surplus produce and other nutritious food that might otherwise go to waste and redistributing it through client-choice pop-up markets and community-based food access programs.

“We give New Yorkers the choice of the food they want to be nourished with,” George says. “Much of the fresh produce we rescue isn’t readily available in neighborhood bodegas. We believe food assistance should be dignified, culturally relevant, and centered on the preferences of the communities we serve.”

Looking ahead, George envisions transforming uptown neighborhoods into thriving hubs of urban agriculture, with vertical gardens and community-driven food systems that make fresh, healthy food more accessible for everyone.

To enter this month’s $250 giveaway, head to our Instagram where you can nominate yourself or another New Yorker. Simply tag your nominee in a comment and share what you (or they) are doing to impact the city for good.

Enter June Giveaway!

🚕 Opportunities

• NYSCA's FY2027 grants are open. Applicants from all artistic practices and disciplines are encouraged to apply. Grant awards are $10,000. Apply by July 8, 2026.

• NYFA's Rauschenberg Medical Emergency Grants provide up to $5,000 to artists facing a recent, unexpected medical, dental, or mental health emergency. Apply by July 14, 2026.

• CitizensNYC Community Leaders Grants offer up to $5,000 grants to community-building projects carried out by resident-led groups to improve neighborhood life, strengthen local leadership, and scale community partnerships. Apply by July 27, 2026.

• CitizensNYC Neighborhood Business Grants offer up to $5,000 for community-minded small businesses giving back to their neighborhoods. Apply by July 27, 2026.

• Apply for a $1,000 Awesome Foundation Grant. The Awesome Foundation is a global community advancing the interest of awesome in the universe, $1,000 at a time. Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.

• The New York Community Trust is accepting nonprofit proposals year-round, funding projects that improve life across the five boroughs. Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.

✏️ New York Cartoon Corner

This month’s incredible cartoon comes from and Scott Dooley.

Jason was also kind enough to share a little behind the scenes of the creation of this month’s cartoon:

New York Cartoons

Process Video: "Resting Knicks Face" - A Cartoon for New York's Newsletter

Read more

3 months ago · 6 likes · 2 comments · Jason Chatfield

Psssst. Want to submit to next month’s cartoon corner? You can do so HERE. We pay $750 for each cartoon accepted for publication in our newsletter.

Nearly nine million people call New York City home. Every year, The David Prize has the honor of hearing from thousands who make us believe the best is still ahead.

This year’s 15 finalists are building the infrastructure of everyday New York life, stubbornly and deliberately. They’re gardening in the harbor and dancing in the streets, fighting for mom-and-pop restaurants and for the doulas struggling to get paid. They’re publishing the neighborhood paper and giving trash new life. Together, they remind us what this city looks like when people refuse to give up on it. They represent the best of the city.

Meet the 2026 David Prize finalists and tune in this fall to meet the five winners!

• Aaliyah Duah: Giving NYC public school students relatable education on personal finance

• Anna Sacks: Building the first municipal Office of Circularity to rethink how New Yorkers discard their trash

• Bianca Frezgi: Enabling every doula in NYC to accept insurance with ease

• Cathy Kim: Unlocking economic opportunities for the small contractors who keep New York City running

• Chad Vill: Bringing joy, music, and dancing to New York's streets, one block at a time

• Dr. Dave Ores: Helping New Yorkers have easier access to medical care and health information, regardless of ability to pay

• Isaac Adlerstein: Empowering NYC houses of worship to turn crisis into stability for neighbors experiencing homelessness

• Jaeki Cho: Fighting for mom-and-pop restaurants that feed New York -- through storytelling, visibility, and hands-on support

• Lorenzo Tijerina: Publishing Sunset Park's first trilingual newspaper, bringing together its diverse residents

• Nick Marsella: Building a philharmonic orchestra comprised of New Yorkers experiencing homelessness

• Nikolas Bentel: Making local manufacturing possible by connecting people and businesses with manufacturers and artisans in NYC

• Oded Oren: Ensuring New York's courts and judges answer to New Yorkers

• Regina Carter: Rerouting New York's excess furniture to NYC residents who need it, one free pop-up at a time

• Seva Granik: Building a home and support system for New York's queer nightlife workers

• Shanjana Mahmud: Restoring New York's 520 miles of shoreline with regenerative seaweed aquaculture

Pssst… Did you know you can nominate individuals for the Prize year round?

Nominate a New Yorker!

In an effort to share what we learn along the way, our Executive Director Erika Augustine is sharing her (semi-weekly) New Yorker dispatches on her LinkedIn. Think of it as an inside look into our notes as we travel (almost exclusively via Citi Bike) across the city, keeping you up-to-date on New Yorkers who have incredible insights and should be on your radar!

Tune In!

🍕New York Happenings

• David Prize Winner Colby Xzavier King is building the Kiki Arts Collaborative, connecting NYC’s Kiki Ballroom scene – whose creativity has shaped fashion, dance, and pop culture for decades – with the mentorship and career tools to finally benefit from it.

• Stanley Richards spent two years in Rikers as a young man, now he runs the place as NYC’s new Department of Correction commissioner, the first formerly incarcerated person to ever hold the role.

• It turns out competitive chess is what New York City Kids are built for. Spend a day in the life with the New York City kids winning national chess championships.

• Head to The Met to hear David Prize Winner Rana Abdelhamid discuss her debut novel Get Home Safe. Rana, a lifelong organizer and karate black belt, founded Malikah to teach self-defense and collective safety to women across NYC, and her book brings those same teachings to the page.

• Before there were galleries, there were whole subway cars. Lee Quiñones - perhaps better known by his tag ‘LEE - reflects on what it was like coming up in the 80s New York City art scene.

💸 Meet Our April Giveaway Winner

Our April winner is Rusty Zimmerman, a Brooklyn-based artist that founded The Free Portrait Project, a collection of painted portraits and recorded oral histories of Brooklyn residents. He’s currently working on painting a collection of 50 portraits, and will paint up to 200 portraits for Red Hook residents with additional funding. This will live as a free exhibition this summer (more info to come!), and then be returned to the residents who were painted. You can learn more & support the project here!

“I just let the people who live there tell their story,” says Rusty. “I’m able to paint people, I’m able to record their stories, and let that become an aggregate picture of the place in that moment.”

To enter this month’s $250 giveaway, head to our Instagram where you can nominate yourself or another New Yorker. Simply tag your nominee in a comment and share what you (or they) are doing to impact the city for good.

Enter our May giveaway!

🚕 Opportunities

• The Brooklyn Org Spark Prize is accepting applications from Brooklyn nonprofits to receive their annual $100,000 Spark Prize. The Prize is named after their mission to spark change for a fair and just Brooklyn. Apply by May 15, 2026.

• The Empire State Fellows Program is accepting applications for its 2027-2029 class, a paid, two-year leadership training program for professionals who want to work directly with senior New York State policymakers, with a $90,000 annual salary and benefits. Apply by June 1, 2026.

• CitizensNYC has opened up applications for their Community Leaders Grant, a $5,000 microgrant to community-building projects carried out by resident-led groups to improve neighborhood life, strengthen local leadership, and scale community partnerships. Apply by July 2026.

• Apply for a $1,000 Awesome Foundation Grant. The Awesome Foundation is a global community advancing the interest of awesome in the universe, $1000 at a time. Each fully autonomous chapter supports awesome projects through micro-grants, usually given out monthly. Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.

• Crowdfunder is looking for 50 nonprofits to become the founding partners in New York. 8 selected nonprofits will have every donation matched up to $2,500 as part of the Spark Fund. Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.

✏️ New York Cartoon Corner

Our May Cartoon comes from Jeremy Nguyen. (P.S. You can submit your own cartoon to next month’s Cartoon Corner HERE!)

Speaking of extraordinary things—here’s what’s been unfolding at The David Prize and the city that continues to keep us on our paws feet.

🍕New York Happenings

• Meet the real Marty Supreme—Yasiris Ortiz, a 28-year-old star from the Bronx, is helping to bring free table tennis programing to children across the city.

• Take a peek into the family behind The David Prize and learn more about why we believe in the individual as a unit for change.

• When we approached Tara Sansone, the Executive Director at Materials for the Arts, to tell us what she dreams about—she posed a great question: What if every city (and every borough in NYC!) provided artists with free supplies?

• Last month, Prize winner Colby Xzavier King had his own exhibit in the Bronx—Archives of Belonging brought together artists from New York’s Kiki Ballroom scene whose work documents and reimagines how belonging is created on their own terms. While it’s too late to go check it out IRL, you can still virtually tour the exhibition!

• As an artist, Walter Price’s time in the Navy makes him something of an outlier. It wasn’t easy for Walter Price to move to New York and pursue a totally new career, but he says his dream has come true.

🗽David Prize April Giveaway

In March we started our monthly Instagram giveaway of $250 intended for a New Yorker who is pushing the city forward and could use an extra no-strings-attached boost! We announced March’s winner (see below!), and now we’re looking for April’s winner!

Our March winner is Evelyn Alvarez, a Bronx-based doula dedicated to advancing maternal health in the city. She co-founded the reproductive and birth justice collective BX Rebirth, and Prom King, an initiative that provides formal attire to young men in NYC for their milestone moments.

Evelyn says winning this extra boost “feels like an affirmation of the time I’ve contributed to make different corners of the world less heavy.” We’re grateful for New Yorkers like Evelyn. (Shoutout to her husband for the nomination!)

To enter, head to our Instagram where you can nominate yourself or another New Yorker. Simply tag your nominee in a comment and share what you (or they) are doing to impact the city for good.

Enter April's Giveaway!

🚕 Opportunities

• The Urban Future Prize Competition is a NYC-based climate tech competition awarding two $50,000 grand prizes and two $10,000 runner-up prizes to startups working on climate mitigation and adaptation. Apply by April 27, 2026.

• Applications are open for Blue Ridge Labs’ Founder Fellowship! The fellowship is a 20-week program designed to help early-stage founders explore bold ideas and develop them into fundable social impact ventures that drive economic mobility. Apply by May 3, 2026.

• The Brooklyn Org Spark Prize is accepting applications from Brooklyn nonprofits to receive their annual $100,000 Spark Prize. The Prize is named after their mission to spark change for a fair and just Brooklyn. Apply by May 15, 2026.

• CitizensNYC has opened up applications for their Community Leaders Grant, a $5,000 microgrant to community-building projects carried out by resident-led groups to improve neighborhood life, strengthen local leadership, and scale community partnerships. Apply by July 2026.

• Apply for a $1,000 Awesome Foundation Grant. The Awesome Foundation is a global community advancing the interest of awesome in the universe, $1000 at a time. Each fully autonomous chapter supports awesome projects through micro-grants, usually given out monthly. Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.

• The International Center of Photography is thrilled to host the fifth Photobook Fest, May 8-10, 2026. For one weekend, ICP welcomes over 80 publishers bringing the best in photobook making to the Lower East Side. The weekend will be packed with publisher tablings, hand-on workshops, talks, and pop-up exhibitions!

• See NYC 2.0 is coming this spring for another jam packed three days, May 13-15, 2026! This time, the home base will be in FiDi and participants will be visiting sites in Manhattan, Queens and Staten Island. Applications are open now.

✏️ New York Cartoon Corner

For our April Cartoon…well…we think New Yorkers will understand. Thank you to for this very timely take on the weather!

The David Prize has spent years investing in New Yorkers’ potential—awarding $200,000, no strings attached to people with big ideas for the city. But along the way we learned there’s something money can’t buy: trust. The trust that forms when people in the same city, working on the same problems, get in the same room. We’ve spent a lot of time ‘funding serendipity’—events, dinner tables, gatherings to seed new connections and trust across aisles, boroughs, and sectors.

Breakout has spent years designing immersive city experiences for impact leaders across the country learning about what it takes to create gatherings where real relationships form.

Together, we shared an instinct: New Yorkers need a gathering designed for and by us. Not to share work or ideas, but simply to learn about the city we’re all a part of shaping. See NYC is that gathering.

In October 2025, See NYC’s inaugural event brought together 150 New Yorkers from every borough, sector, and background for three days, exploring community spaces, learning from city leaders, sharing long dinners. No name tags or panels. Just people who care deeply about New York in the same space.

See NYC is made possible by a community of foundations and individuals based in New York City who share the belief that serendipity is worth funding and that the next chapter of this city will be written by the people willing to show up for it.

Want to learn more? We’re accepting applications for See NYC 2026 taking place May 13–15, 2026. We’d love to see you there!

Learn More & Apply!

🍕New York Happenings

• Celebrate Eid in the heart of Little Egypt with halal food, culture, and community at Malikah’s NYC Eid Festival & Market! Founded by David Prize winner Rana Abdelhamid, Malikah will be transforming Steinway Street into a lively (free!) celebration. Reserve your spot & learn more here.

• David Prize winner & Kiki Arts Collaborative Colby King opened up an exhibit last month that’s free & open to the public! Presented across Black History Month and Women’s History Month, KAC’s inaugural exhibition Archives of Belonging interrogates how identity functions both as a site of refuge and exclusion. Showing until April 4, 2026.

• Turns out Florida isn’t the only prized retirement destination. The New York Times profiled a wave of older folks trading suburban houses for walkable NYC apartments, drawn by, among other things, the simple pleasure of being in the best city in the world.

• Across NYC, people facing mental health challenges often live in spaces that feel overwhelming or unsafe. 2025 David Prize finalist Davina Furbert offers something rare: cleaning and decluttering support grounded in care, not judgment. covered her story.

• The Whitney Biennial opened earlier this month, and Gothamist brought together its youngest and oldest participants for a conversation. Taína Cruz, 29, raised in Harlem and the Bronx, and Samia Halaby, 89, a Palestinian artist who’s called New York home since the 1960s, talked ancestry, intuition, and what it means to keep making art across a lifetime.

• If you missed our Valentine’s Day newsletter last month, take a peek at the Brooklyn Reader article covering our 2026 Surprize recipients! The Surprize is one of our microgrant programs all about New Yorkers loving other New Yorkers!

🗽David Prize Giveaway

The David Prize is known for giving five New Yorkers $200,000 each, each year, but we know there are far more extraordinary New Yorkers doing work to impact the city! That’s why we’re starting a monthly Instagram giveaway of $250 intended for a New Yorker who is pushing the city forward and could use an extra no-strings-attached boost!

You might be a university student training for a career as a public defender, a community organizer running a mutual aid initiative, or a health worker pushing through burnout.

To figure out how to enter, head to our Instagram! You can nominate yourself or another New Yorker. We can’t wait to hear from you.

Enter the March Giveaway!

🚕 Opportunities

• See NYC 2.0 is coming this spring for another jam packed three days, May 13-15, 2026! This time, our home base will be in FiDi and we’ll be visiting sites in Manhattan, Queens and Staten Island. Applications are open now.

• The CFDA x NY Forward Grant Fund is a grant program developed by the Council of Fashion Designers of America (CFDA) in partnership with New York State’s Department of State and its NY Forward initiative. The program is designed to drive innovation, strengthen local production, and ensure the Garment District remains a vital hub for the fashion industry. Apply by March 24, 2026.

• Verizon in partnership with LISC is awarding $5,000 grants to 25 small businesses based in New York to help them grow. Apply by Mar 31, 2026.

• The Woodman Family Foundation via NYFA awards $30,000 distributed over three years to help artists in housing insecurity stay housed and keep making work. Applicants must be 21+, have lived in NYC for at least five consecutive years, and have an adjusted gross income of $80,000 or below. Apply by April 14, 2026.

• Applications are open for Blue Ridge Labs’ Founder Fellowship! The fellowship is a 20-week program designed to help early-stage founders explore bold ideas and develop them into fundable social impact ventures that drive economic mobility. Apply by May 3, 2026.

• CitizensNYC just opened up applications for their Community Leaders Grant, a $5,000 microgrant to community-building projects carried out by resident-led groups to improve neighborhood life, strengthen local leadership, and scale community partnerships. Apply by July 2026.

• Apply for a $1,000 Awesome Foundation Grant. The Awesome Foundation is a global community advancing the interest of awesome in the universe, $1000 at a time. Each fully autonomous chapter supports awesome projects through micro-grants, usually given out monthly. Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.

✏️ New York Cartoon Corner

For our March Cartoon, we have a painfully relevant one from Anjali Chandrashekar… watching the snow forecasted to return as we write this!

And yes, today is a day to celebrate love—so for the second year in a row, we’re telling the stories of a few Surprize winners. If you don’t already know, each year David Prize winners get access to The Surprize—a one time $5,000 no-strings-attached microprize intended to pay it forward to New Yorkers in their orbits.

Read on to learn about why each winner chose their Surprize recipient and how they’re impacting New York!

Meet the 2026 Surprize Winners!

Learn more about Craig's work

Learn more about Mikel's work

Learn more about Elliot's work

Learn more about Coach B's work

Learn more about Tara's work

🍕New York Happenings

• This past month, Kiki Arts Collaborative—led by ‘25 Winner Colby Xzavier King—held their first ball. Hosted by Yoncé Scott and Kimberly Joneś, the electric Miss USA Kiki Ball was described as being “inspired by ballroom’s origins in beauty pageants and Black beauty pageants, this ball was a celebration of those who paved the way and those who continue to redefine what beauty looks like on their own terms.”

• Anne Kadet of recently profiled Eganam Segbefia, a talented trumpet player New Yorkers can often hear playing in Grand Central, always outfitted in a tuxedo. Kadet discussed Segbefia’s signature suit and his journey to NYC from Lagos, Nigeria as a kid—as New York a story as they come.

• Last week, a federal judge recommended certifying a class in Gould v. City of New York, a landmark lawsuit seeking to end the New York City Administration for Children’s Services’s widespread practice of using coercion to enter and search families’ homes during investigations. A big win for ‘23 Winner David Shalleck-Klein, founder of the Family Justice Law Center.

• This family learned how to turn this frigid weather in their favor—DIYing an ice skating rink in their small backyard. Huge day for New Yorkers with a little outdoor space!

• Former David Prize advisor Rafael Espinal has been appointed Commissioner of the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment and Yesenia Mata just made history as NYC’s first Latina veterans commissioner.

🗽After The Prize: Meet 2020 Winner Suzette Brown!

Long before Dr. Suzette Brown won The David Prize in 2020 for her work building Strong Children Wellness, she learned what community care looked like inside her mother’s preschool. Raised by Jamaican immigrant parents between Brooklyn and Long Island, Suzette and her twin sister grew up at Tiny Tots Kollege, the Hempstead preschool their mother founded in the 1980s. It was never just a school. “She went beyond just educating the kids,” Suzette says. “She did so much to support the parents.” Suzette saw proof at a young age that caring for children meant caring for families as a whole.

That philosophy followed Suzette into medicine. After navigating medical school and early work in global HIV programs, Suzette became increasingly drawn to the reality that children’s health was shaped not just by medical needs, but by social needs like housing, food security, and addressing trauma. What frustrated her most was how little traditional healthcare allowed her to address those realities.

Strong Children Wellness emerged as a direct response. Instead of centering care just in hospitals, Suzette and her collaborators embedded pediatric primary care within trusted community organizations to screen families for unemployment, homelessness, mental health needs, and more, and to connect them with support, starting with the Child Center of New York in Queens. Just as the model was taking physical shape in 2020, Suzette was awarded The David Prize.

Five years later, Strong Children Wellness has grown exponentially, serving more than 2,100 families across the five boroughs in their Queens sites, integrating primary care, behavioral health, care management, and social services all under one roof. “Sometimes I sit back and think, ‘How did this grow from this idea to this thing that has just really taken on a life of its own?,’” Suzette says. “It's been an absolutely remarkable, incredible journey.” With new state funding to expand even further, Suzette’s David Prize vision has evolved into a living model: one that proves healthcare works best when meeting families where they are.

Learn more about Suzette's work!

🚕 Opportunities

• See NYC 2.0 is coming this spring for another jam packed three days, May 13-15, 2026! This time, our home base will be in FiDi and we’ll be visiting sites in Manhattan, Queens and Staten Island. Applications are open now.

• Brooklyn Org is now accepting applications for microgrants. This funding will support organizations not yet eligible for their Strategic Grants or other prizes due to budget requirements; microgrants will support community-based organizations with budgets of under $100,000. Applications are open year-round.

• Apply for a $1,000 Awesome Foundation Grant. The Awesome Foundation is a global community advancing the interest of awesome in the universe, $1000 at a time. Each fully autonomous chapter supports awesome projects through micro-grants, usually given out monthly. Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.

✏️ New York Cartoon Corner

For February’s Cartoon Corner we are featuring Sofia Warren who was answering the prompt Winter in New York.

To live up to our mission, we needed to find new ways to support more New Yorkers. We expanded our funding through programs like the Surprize. We gather New Yorkers at experiences like our 3-day staycation See NYC, dinners parties themed around big questions facing New York, and field trips open to anyone interested in visiting unique places around the city. And we storytell, which has become an important part of how we further our mission. To do this, we started a new platform: What’s the Big Idea.

What’s the Big Idea is a short-form video series where each episode introduces a New Yorker and their big idea for the city’s future. We hope this series becomes a town square for New Yorkers to dream out loud.

Tune in to What’s the Big Idea for new videos every week on our Instagram and TikTok! Know anyone who should be featured? We’re always accepting new ideas, submit them HERE!

Watch the show!

Meet Al Mullen, Comedian & Founder of Public Transport Magazine

At The David Prize, we’re always meeting New Yorkers impacting the city for the better. One of these New Yorkers was Al, who our Executive Director Erika Augustine reached out to after reading about his work building Public Transport Magazine in Gothamist (truth: it was to buy a PTM t-shirt). They met for coffee and the rest, as they say, was history.

Meet Rosa Chang, Founder of Gotham Park

We met Rosa in our open call where she pitched us a massive dream: build a park under the Manhattan side of the Brooklyn Bridge. We stayed connected since she was a finalist for the Prize in 2024. To nobody’s surprise the park, Gotham Park, has grown into the exact vision she shared with us. Rosa manages four open acres, regularly hosts community events, and now, is working to restore and reopen vaults inside the Brooklyn Bridge that have been closed since the late-1900s.

Meet Carla Davis, Local Politics Content Creator

As part of our outreach, we’re always scouring the web for New Yorkers doing great work. Our Director of Marketing Gina Fuchs met Carla on TikTok, where Carla built a platform democratizing local politics for New Yorkers. Carla breaks down the fundamentals in local news cycles, ballot proposal explanations during local elections, and interviews the people actually making the sausage.

Huge shoutout & thank you to John Tanner, our videographer and Irina Koryagina, our designer for bringing this series to life!

🎙️Introducing New York’s Newsletter the Podcast

Tune into the New York’s Newsletter podcast! Our first episode is an interview with David Prize Executive Director Erika Augustine and Gotham Park President Rosa Chang. In it, they discuss everything from the inception of Gotham Park to the power of Rosa’s extensive boa collection.

Preview the Podcast…

🍕Prize Community Happenings

Jhody Devon Polk Officially Launches the Legal Empowerment and Advocacy Hub

David Prize ‘25 winner Jhody Polk officially launched the Legal Empowerment and Advocacy Hub—the next chapter of the Jailhouse Lawyer Initiative. With our friends at Anew HQ, the Bernstein Institute at NYU Law, and Zealous, Jhody hosted an incredible debut including a talk and interactive exhibition honoring the work of jailhouse lawyers in New York. Learn more about Jhody’s work here!

Two Prize Community Members are Running for NY State Assembly

Another big update from the Prize community: Prize winner Rana Abdelhamid and Prize finalist Jibreel Jalloh are both running for NY State Assembly seats. Rana is running in District 36 representing Astoria and Long Island City. Jibreel is running in District 59, representing waterfront communities in Canarsie, Mill Basin, Georgetown and Bergen Beach.

Learn more about Rana’s campaign here and Jibreel’s campaign here!

🚕 Opportunities

• Apply for a $1,000 Awesome Foundation Grant. The Awesome Foundation is a global community advancing the interest of awesome in the universe, $1000 at a time. Each fully autonomous chapter supports awesome projects through micro-grants, usually given out monthly. Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.

• Amplify Her Incubator is a 6-month program that equips women leaders with training, mentorship, and funding to turn bold ideas into action. Apply by January 30, 2026.

• The CitizensNYC just opened up applications for their Neighborhood Business Grants, offering up to $5,000 for initiatives small businesses undertakes to positively impact their communities. Apply by February 2, 2026.

✏️ New York Cartoon Corner

For December’s Cartoon Corner we asked folks to draw a cartoon that evokes Winter in NYC. This month we’re featuring Anjali Chandrashekar who is celebrating New York’s most famous winter sound.

In 2020, Rosa saw something she couldn’t unsee—acres and acres of unused, often blocked off space under the Manhattan side of the Brooklyn Bridge that 30,000 pedestrians pass over daily. Rosa was dumbfounded when she noticed the space was empty year after year. Despite never having built a park or anything like it, Rosa decided she was going to transform the space under the Brooklyn Bridge into a flourishing public park.

Against all odds, Gotham Park—the 501c3 Rosa co-founded—has already made incredible progress. The first acre of their nine-acre space was opened in May 2023 and over three more acres have been opened since. Gotham Park has helped restore and reopen the iconic Big Banks and Small Banks, and the park is functional, hosting regular events and communities from the surrounding neighborhoods.

To the procrastinating New Yorkers: we see you, we love you, we want to hear from you. Step 1 is only three questions:

1. In one sentence, tell us how you plan to make New York City a better place for more of us.

2. Now expand on your answer: give us a broader view into your plans and tell us more specifically what you’re going to do in New York City.

3. Why are you uniquely positioned to make your vision a reality?

That’s it. We know you can do it—it’s now or never next year.

Submit your idea NOW!

Add a reminder to your calendar!

If you need a reminder, add the deadline to your calendar HERE and take the weekend to fill out your Prize submission before it’s too late.

Know someone who should be submitting an idea, but might need a nudge? Click the button below to send them this post! 👇

Share

A question by question guide for Step 1:

A step by step breakdown of the entire process with David Prize manager, Gina Fuchs, and Prize winner, Barry Cooper:

David Prize winners’ advice for YOU:

You’re ready to go! Now…

Submit your idea TODAY!

And with the deadline coming up, we’re sharing a few tips and resources to help you get Step 1 in before November 17th! Click into the post below to read them 👇

• Submit HERE before November 17th, 2025 at 6 PM ET.

• Nominate a New Yorker HERE (but as a reminder, you don’t need to be nominated and even if you are nominated, you still have to submit Step 1!).

Submit your idea today!

🍕New York Happenings

• Have you ever wondered why there’s a Dino Store at Grand Army Plaza? For the past 3 years, the MTA has invited artists & non-profits to take over vacant space in subway stations, reimagining what we can do with public spaces. 2025 Prize finalist Barbara Anderson runs one of them, and now you can virtually tour it.

• “In NYC, the Kiki scene is more than culture — it’s an investment.” Colby King, a 2025 David Prize Winner, was featured in The Advocate talking about his organization, Kiki Arts Collaborative, which aims to connect these youth to economic opportunity.

• We threw The Most New York Party last week and wrote our favorite review of it.

🗽Introducing What’s the Big Idea

For years The David Prize has asked folks what they’re dreaming up for New York City. While five are ultimately awarded The David Prize, thousands more share their ideas with us. So we created What’s the Big Idea, a short-form video series profiling New Yorkers and their ideas for NYC’s future. We’ve met with folks around the five boroughs learning about ideas big and small, absurd and pragmatic, personal and silly—we’re interested in what every New Yorker’s dream is for how to make the city even better. Here are just a few:

🌉 Meet Rosa Chang, Founder of Gotham Park

🚇 Meet Al Mullen, Founder of Public Transport Magazine

📜 Meet Asad Dandia, Founder of New York Narratives

Want to be featured? Share your idea here for a chance to get on the show!

Watch What's the Big Idea

🚕 Opportunities

• Submit your idea for The David Prize by November 17th, 2025 at 6PM ET.

• Catalyst from Robin Hood is an accelerator program where participants receive $100,000 in funding and participate in a 16-week program designed to take projects from early traction to a scalable venture. Apply by November 21st, 2025.

• Brooklyn Org is now accepting applications for microgrants. This funding will support organizations not yet eligible for their Strategic Grants or other prizes due to budget requirements; microgrants will support community-based organizations with budgets of under $100,000. Apply by November 30th, 2025.

• Citizens Committee Community Leaders Grants offer up to $5,000 for projects that bring New Yorkers together to improve neighborhood life, strengthen local leadership, and scale community partnerships. Apply by February 2nd, 2026.

🗓️ Upcoming Events

➡️ David Prize Panel at The World’s Borough Bookshop 
October 19, 2025 from 3 PM - 4:15 PM
34-06 73rd St, Jackson Heights, NY 11372
Sign up HERE.

➡️ David Prize Office Hours in Prospect Park
October 25, 2025 from 12 - 2 PM
Long Meadow North, Prospect Park, Brooklyn NY 11215
Sign up HERE.

➡️ David Prize Panel at ANEW World
October 28, 2025 from 6 - 8 PM
West Village, New York (RSVP below for the exact address!)
Sign up HERE.

➡️ David Prize Virtual Q&A
Ongoing!
Have questions about The David Prize process? Write to us at the link below and we’ll compile answers as questions come in.
Submit your question anonymously HERE. Access answers HERE.

Submit your idea TODAY!

Don’t forget: submissions for The David Prize close November 17, 2025 at 6PM ET. Submit an idea, or nominate a New Yorker you know.

Submit Your Idea TODAY!

This isn’t about polished resumes or perfect pitch decks. It’s about impact. Boldness. Real New York energy. Here’s the ask: Nominate someone. Tell them to submit their idea. Pass this on. Let’s make sure folks who are too busy doing the work don’t miss an opportunity to get recognized and resourced.

The 2025 David Prize Open Call is live through November 17, 2025! Let’s flood it with New York’s best.

🗣️ Host an info session

Request an info session about The David Prize at your organization, company, non-profit, neighborhood organization, or other group (like a book club or volunteer group) based in NYC. Sharing the Prize in new networks sparks potential New Yorkers that we might not otherwise have on our radar. Plus, it’s really fun to nominate together. Sessions are available throughout September and October; we will let you know in advance if your event is selected for us to join!

Invite TDP to join your event

💌 Virtually spread the word

80% of David Prize Winners over the last 2 years have heard about the Prize through word of mouth. Help us spread the word about the Prize to your friends, family, colleagues, neighbors, social media followers, newsletter readers, and other New Yorkers you think ought to know about the Prize. Click the link below to easily create your post about The David Prize on social media or put the opportunity in an upcoming newsletter.

Spread the Word!

✍️ Nominate a New Yorker

The David Prize accepts nominations year-round. Know a New Yorker who should submit their idea? Click the button below to nominate them for the Prize!

Nominate a New Yorker

🎤Join Us IRL for a Q&A in October!

We’re hosting a public Q&A at The World’s Borough Bookshop in Jackson Heights! A Prize team member, along with two former Winners, will share insights into the Prize process, answering your burning questions about what to expect!

RSVP

This year’s David Prize winners are not just waiting for someone else to fix things. They’re not just dreaming up bold ideas. From legally empowering locals, to leading community safety workshops, these New Yorkers are building their ideas, block by block, taking it upon themselves to show us what this city is truly capable of.

Now… meet the 2025 David Prize Winners!

Barry Cooper

Colby Xzavier King

Jenny Bright

Jhody Devon Polk

Rana Abdelhamid

Meet the 2025 Winners!

Portraits by Evelyn Freja with additional photography by Jutharat Pinyodoonyachet

The David Prize Open Call is LIVE!

Are you a New Yorker who...

• Has a real, deep love for New York (some may call it an obsession...)

• Has an audacious vision and plans to make the city even better

• Boasts a long track record of making (nearly impossible) things happen

• Can make good use of no-strings-attached funding

If your answer to these questions is ‘yes,’ then you should consider submitting to this year’s Prize! Submissions close November 17, 2025 at 6PM ET.

Submit an idea, or nominate a New Yorker you know.

Submit Your Idea!

🍕New York News

• Art on the Ave NYC is a community-driven non-profit founded by 2025 David Prize Finalist Barbara Anderson. They revitalize unused retail space with art from the neighborhood, creating 'art walks' that anyone can enjoy, free of charge. This month, they popped up at Alfred E. Smith Houses along St. James Place on the Lower East Side. Learn more and plan your visit HERE.

• Brooklyn has no shortage of landmarks and Green-Wood Cemetery is one of our best, but it wasn’t always that way. Richard J. Moylan, Green-Wood’s director for four decades, is the reason it’s the special place it is today. His retirement marks the end of an era!

• Marj Kleinman was profiled as a New Yorker of the Week for her work bringing neighbors together through stories and stoop gatherings. Her organization Stoop Stories gives folks a glimpse into this quintessential New York happening (Stoop kids never leave the stoop!).

• Following a lawsuit led by 2023 David Prize Winner David Shalleck-Klein and his team at Family Justice Law Center, an appellate court ruled that NYC’s ACS unlawfully surveilled a domestic violence survivor. The lawsuit sets a vital precedent for protecting those already harmed.

🗽Hear from a Prize Community Member!

Every now and then, New York's Newsletter spotlights the people that make this city so special. This summer we took a tour of Little Syria with Asad Dandia who is community organizer, museum educator, and local historian born and raised in Brooklyn.

Interested in learning about the lesser known histories of New York City? We know a guy... New York Narratives is a walking tour company and storytelling project uncovering the stories of New York City led by Brooklyn-born educator, historian, and tour guide, Asad Dandia.

Through his company New York Narratives, Asad leads walking tours, hosts storytelling and research workshops, and builds partnerships with museums and cultural institutions.

To Asad, walking tours aren't just tours, they are walking histories meant to uphold and honor the generations of New Yorkers who made New York City into the place we call home today. And, while New York Narratives is only a few years old, Asad has been doing impactful work in New York for decades, including suing the largest police force in the country (NYPD!) for unlawful surveillance of New York Muslims, at only 20 years old after being surveilled himself.

Keep up with his work by following on Substack or on Instagram here.

🚕 Opportunities

• This October, we are gathering 150 New Yorkers for See NYC, a three-day experience like no other including bespoke site visits, fireside chats, and city adventures built for connection and imagination made possible by our friends at Breakout and other partners. Learn more and apply here!

• NYC FutureForward is a localized, hybrid leadership development program that grants $10,000 in funding, mentorship, and a powerful peer network to NYC-based leaders who have been impacted by the criminal legal system. Apply by September 8th, 2025.

• Brooklyn Org is accepting applications for their latest funding cycle. Brooklyn Org provides multi-year, general operating support of up to $45,000 per year, for up to three years, for Brooklyn based organizations. Apply by September 30th, 2025.

• Apply for a $1,000 Awesome Foundation Grant. The Awesome Foundation is a global community advancing the interest of awesome in the universe, $1000 at a time. Each fully autonomous chapter supports awesome projects through micro-grants, usually given out monthly. Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.

✏️ New York Cartoon Corner

For August’s Cartoon Corner, we asked folks to draw a cartoon that evokes Summer in NYC. This month we’re featuring Caitlin Du who illustrated a universal New York experience. We’d like to title this one: Visiting The Great Lawn in August.