New Reporting Grants Aim to Strengthen and Elevate Caregiving Coverage

The Better Life Lab at New America invites journalists and storytellers to apply for multimedia reporting grants. We’re seeking stories on solutions to the care crisis, from innovations in child care to investments in family, disability, elder, and end of life care.

We are offering a new round of reporting grants for stories that explore innovations to the care crisis:

Innovations in Child Care: Through reporting on real world efforts already underway, we’re looking for stories that shed light on bright spots and help paint a vision for the future of an equitable, universal child care system that offers families the choices they need and provides living wages for child care educators and providers. The reporting grant initiative is supported by the Bainum Family Foundation and other funders. Pieces should explore child care solutions or address one of the core shifts in care outlined by Bainum’s WeVision EarlyEd program by rethinking when learning begins, who is served, the quality of care, or what it costs and how to pay for it. (You can read more about WeVision here.)

Investing in Care Infrastructure: With an aging population, expectations that care is a private, family matter, often falling on the shoulders of women, and a country that spends among the least among peer nations on care infrastructure, we’re looking for multimedia stories on the challenges and solutions for caregivers across the life cycle, from infant and child care, through disability, elder, and end of life care, that could help unlock investments that bolster gender equality and that help all families thrive.

We’re looking for solutions-oriented stories focusing on how and why care issues matter to families and children, our communities, and a thriving economy with thriving families.

We’re open to all mediums, including print and online stories, photojournalism, graphic stories, podcasts, audio stories, multimedia projects, and videography. We’re excited by new and creative storytelling methods that can reach broad and diverse audiences and help them understand why care matters. Stories should paint a vision of what’s possible in the future, and explore whether innovations could scale. New and experienced reporters are welcome to apply. We also welcome people with traditionally underrepresented viewpoints and perspectives in the media.

If you are interested, fill out the reporting grant application. Stories will be commissioned on a rolling basis beginning in November 2025. Journalists chosen for this program will also be invited to participate in the Better Life Lab’s reporting cohort and receive editorial guidance and placement assistance.

Since 2021, the Better Life Lab has supported more than 20 different storytellers. Together with our team, we’ve produced nearly 70 stories on child care innovations that have appeared in nearly 40 different publications and media outlets. We’re now expanding our focus to cover innovations in care across the life cycle.

Find a list of previous stories and grantees of the Better Life Lab’s Child Care Innovation Reporting Project here.

For questions, please read our Frequently Asked Questions here.