Social Investment Areas

Our strategy is to invest $100M in Cisco Foundation funds over the next decade to help reverse the impact of climate change, working toward a sustainable and regenerative future for all.

The commitment includes both grant and impact investment funding for early-stage climate innovation. Both categories of support will be focused on bold climate solutions, and the grants side will also focus on community education and activation. Grants will go to exceptionally aligned nonprofit organizations, while impact investments will go to highly promising for-profit solutions via the private sector and climate impact funds.

Funding comes from the Cisco Foundation and will focus on:

1. Identifying bold and innovative solutions that:
   • Draw down the carbon already in the atmosphere.
   • Regenerate depleted ecosystems and broadly support the transition to a regenerative future.
2. Developing curricular initiatives to spur community engagement that can lead to measurable behavioral change and collective action.

We will prioritize organizations that can achieve, measure, and report outcomes such as:

• Reducing, capturing and/or sequestering greenhouse gas and carbon emissions.
• Increased energy efficiency and improved mapping and management of natural resources, such as ecosystem restoration, forest treatments, reforestation, afforestation that also will help repair our water cycles.
• Transition to inclusive, just, co-liberatory, and regenerative operating models, ways of being, and ways of organizing economies.
• Creation of, and increase in, access to green jobs and job training.
• Changes in community and individual behavior that lead to carbon footprint reduction, community climate resilience, and localized roadmaps to a sustainable shared climate future for all.

Whenever possible, we will seek projects that support and are informed by Indigenous Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK), Indigenous fire science, decolonized systems theory, and Tribal ways of knowing. These traditional approaches can assist in envisioning and creating viable solutions to issues like forestry and fire risk management. Our hope is to fund hybrid solutions and curricula that combine traditional perspectives with state-of-the-art technology in a way that yields ecosystem restoration while reciprocally benefitting communities as part of our commitment to powering an inclusive future for all.

The following criteria apply only to climate impact and regeneration projects, as deviations from Cisco’s other three issue focus area grant policies and criteria:

• The Cisco Foundation will selectively consider grant proposals from both public and private universities and fundraising entities connected to such universities—but only for measurement and evaluation of existing grants; and/or assistance with extracting, distilling, and aggregating climate impact metrics (carbon drawdown; citizen behavior change); and/or production of massively scalable climate curricular content for general population offerings.
• The Cisco Foundation will also consider program-related and/or other climate impact investments, including solutions that are commercialized out of research and academic institutions as well as incubators.
• Any grant or investment proposal for consideration must meet the criteria and intended outcomes of the climate impact and regeneration program.
• No part of a grant (or investment) proposal can be used to support the passage of specific legislation, nor for any purpose connected with the business of operations of Cisco Systems, such as quid pro quo. Strict policy guidelines are in place to ensure independence. Also, please review our Grant Giving Policies page.

Learn more about our commitment to environmental sustainability and regeneration.

Our strategy is to inclusively invest in technology-based solutions that increase equitable access to education while improving student performance, engagement, and career exploration. We support K-12 solutions that emphasize science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) as well as literacy. We also consider programs that teach environmental sustainability, eliminate barriers to accessing climate change education, and invite student engagement globally to positively affect the environment.

What we look for:

• Innovative early grade solutions using the internet and technology to bridge the barriers preventing access to education for underserved students globally.
• Solutions that positively affect student attendance, attitudes, and behavior while inspiring action by students to improve learning outcomes, whether they participate in person, online, or in blended learning environments. 
• Solutions with high potential to replicate and scale globally, thereby increasing the availability of evidence-based solutions that support student-centricity, teacher capacity in the classroom, and increased parental participation to help students learn and develop.

Note that Cisco does not provide direct funding to nonprofits or schools for the following:

• Sustaining existing programs, interventions, or solutions.
• Geographic replication through sponsorships.
• Purchasing 3rd party technology solutions, including, but not limited to, learning management, customer relationship management, or collaboration technologies.
• Paying on-going operational expenses for teachers/administrators/aids salaries, purchasing supplies, paying student tuition, funding scholarship programs, purchasing equipment (i.e. hardware and/or software), or recurring utilities.

Learn more about our community partners and CSR programs in education.