Why Climate Cardinals
We break language barriers in the climate movement so every community can take action and protect their future.
Climate Cardinals is one of the world’s largest youth-focused climate organizations, working in over 100 languages with volunteers registered across 145 countries.
A fiscally sponsored organization under Future Incubator, a registered 501(c)(3). Tax ID (EIN) 33-3913132.
The problem
Climate information exists. It just isn’t written in most people’s languages.
Billions of people have no access to basic information about how climate change affects them, how to protect their communities, or how to take action. Many of those same communities already hold powerful local knowledge and solutions, but without inclusion in global conversations, funding, and leadership, they cannot scale them.
- 6.8B
People worldwide who don’t speak English, and who are often most affected by the climate crisis.
- <20%
Of the global population speaks English.
- >98%
Of climate information is written in English.
What we do
Three programs, one pathway from information to local leadership.
We remove language exclusion barriers and invest in youth leadership so communities can access critical information, strengthen local action, and build climate-resilient futures.
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Translations
Information people can actually read
Multilingual volunteers make climate information usable in 100+ languages, combining machine translation with human review and local knowledge. Free for grassroots organizations; low rates for institutions.
FY2025 · 145 projects · 30 partners
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Chapters
Local needs, local action
Local teams in schools, universities, and local organizations design climate projects that match local priorities, supported by funding, training, mentorship, and quarterly regranting.
145 active chapters · 1,500+ members · 90% Global Majority · as of November 2026
More than half of our chapters are in Africa, and about a fifth are in South Asia.
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Fellowship
The people who will shape institutions
A one-year program for emerging leaders aged 16–22 from underrepresented backgrounds. Fellows receive stipends, mentorship, a place on one of our core teams, and 14 modules on running climate work.
2026 · 30 fellows · 6,629 applicants from 133 countries
92% of the 6,629 fellowship applicants came from Global Majority communities.
Why Climate Cardinals
What we do that others in the climate sector don’t.
Among environmental organizations, Climate Cardinals uniquely advances climate resilience for all through language justice. We provide free and low-cost translations, support community-led chapters that localize climate action and education, invest in frontline youth leaders through applied learning and access to our network, and work with large institutions to embed language justice across their programs.
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Language justice
Among major environmental NGOs, Climate Cardinals is uniquely focused on language justice for frontline communities, advancing this work through free and low-cost translations, multilingual chapter programming, and research and convenings that shift multilateral institutions and philanthropy.
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Local to global
Among youth-focused organizations, Climate Cardinals stands out for supporting emerging leaders from frontline and non-English-speaking communities who are committed to improving their local communities. We connect them to a global network through peer learning, nominations for partner opportunities, and engagement through UN constituencies and advisory groups.
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Ecosystem infrastructure
We learn openly, then turn those lessons into new approaches that strengthen the wider ecosystem. Through public post-mortems, roundtables, and the Impact Collective, we share what we have learned and built so that other organizations can adapt, improve, and thrive. Our 74-person team runs it on standard operating procedures for every program and a public Program Dashboard.
FY2025 results
We lead with what changed, and report visibility separately.
Change tells you what was different afterwards. Visibility tells you how widely our work traveled. In fiscal year 2025 we made change metrics the centre of how we evaluate ourselves.
Change: what was different afterwards
- +24ppConfidence in taking climate action for their own initiatives
- +27ppConfidence transferring what they learned to someone else
- +34ppConfidence accessing resources, including grants and implementation partners
Gains among matched pre- and post-program respondents in the 2025–2026 Fellowship pilot, n = 11 with 100% reporting. The cohort finished at 11 of a planned 20, because live sessions ran in one time zone. Every fellow who finished would recommend it, and Fellowship 2.0 adds regional groupings and asynchronous participation. Full detail in our post-mortem.
Visibility: how widely our work travels
Outputs and visibility, not outcomes. Views, words delivered, and sign-ups.
- 19MAggregated reach for our educational content across social media and programs, including individual and organizational accounts
- 4M+Words cumulatively translated, across 145 projects
- 3,387Volunteer sign-ups across all programs in 2025
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UNICEF · Africa
Their Climate Risk Index, translated into Indigenous and African languages for 124 UNICEF offices across Africa.
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CARE International
Their Climate and Resiliency Academy, 140,000 words into Spanish, French, and Arabic, for 200 annual participants across 60 countries.
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Climate Mental Health Network
Their Climate Emotions Wheel in 30+ languages, now in 10,000+ U.S. schools and used across the LA region after the wildfires.
How we measure. Evidence on a schedule, not a story at year end. A balanced scorecard sets annual targets each December, revised quarterly. Chapters submit project reports every quarter, translation partners and fellows report twice a year, and the same figures that drive our monthly reviews go public, including the ones that don’t flatter us.
Financial stewardship
We grew our resources by more than 50% in 2026, and the year is already largely committed.
Annual budget
$354,000 → $541,000
FY2025 to FY2026 resources, including in-kind support from Zoom and monday.com.
- This yearThe $541,000 covers planned expenditure plus in-kind support, with earned income from advisory and speaking work on top.
- NextFY2027 and FY2028 scale to $1,018,412 and $1,124,027 in expenditure as chapters, fellowships, and translation capacity grow.
- ResilienceBuilding reserves toward a 12–16 month runway, so we can spend our time on strategy and effective programming rather than on constant fundraising, and toward independent 501(c)(3) status.
Transparency
We publish what we spend and what it produces. Our financial summary sets out income, expenditure, and how each program is resourced, alongside the impact report and the live dashboard that track what that funding delivered.
As a fiscally sponsored project of Future Incubator, our accounts sit within their 501(c)(3) reporting and oversight. If you are considering a gift or a grant and want detail we have not published, ask us and we will send it.
What funding unlocks
Our 2026 goals, and where we actually stand against them.
We set these targets each December and report against them as the year runs. Several are already passed, because demand outran our plan: we budgeted for 85 chapters and young people started more than twice that. Where we fall short, we say so. Our team is 74 people, including full-time and part-time staff, contractors, volunteers, and our 2026–2027 fellows.
- Active chapters145 of 85 targetSurpassed
- Annual translation capacityCapacity to translate 2.5M words a year, of 2.5M targetMet
- Fellowship cohort30 of 30 targetSelected from 6,629 applicants in 133 countriesMet
- Digital reach1.2M impressions per month, of 1M monthly targetSurpassed
- White papers advancing language justice2 of 4, with a third near completionIn progress
- Impact Collective partner organizations6 of 10In progress
- Value delivered to grassroots partners through translations$241.7K of $1M targetRevised down while we rebuild our volunteer translator base on the new platformRevised down
Chapters and translation value update live from our Program Dashboard. Other figures are current as of Q3 2026 and updated quarterly.
Switching translation platforms multiplied our capacity fivefold, but capacity is not output. We expect close to 500,000 words again in 2026 while we rebuild our volunteer translator base on the new platform, scaling toward capacity in 2027. That same transition is why value delivered will land below our $1M target.
What we are raising for
We are raising $3.5M over three years: $1.6M for programs, $850,000 for personnel, $820,000 for reserves, and $230,000 to complete our transition to independent 501(c)(3) status. Reserves buy longevity, so our attention goes to programming rather than to raising next quarter’s funding.
Our biggest risk is undercapitalization. Thin salary funding drives staff transitions, and each one costs institutional knowledge we have to rebuild. The same exposure runs through fellow stipends, chapter regranting, and professional development: the first things to come under pressure, and exactly what makes a chapter or a fellowship durable.
What it costs. A chapter runs on about $1,645 a year. A fellow costs about $6,133, including stipend. Translations run on a flat $17,200 at current capacity. A $50,000 grant is roughly thirty chapters for a year, or eight fellows, or close to three years of translations at current capacity.
Talk to us about funding thisOur team
Advised by people who have run things at scale, funded by institutions that checked.
Since 2024, we have been led by a full-time Executive Director, working with a Chief Operating Officer, a Chief Programs Officer, a Chief of Staff, and program staff, alongside the fellows and volunteers who deliver and evaluate our programs.
Our team holds seats on the WHO Youth Council and UNESCO’s Youth Climate Action Steering Committee, and has served on the UN Secretary-General’s Youth Advisory Group on Climate Change.
Current and past supporters
- Google.org
- The Nature Conservancy
- UNESCO
- Coachtopia
- Kito Impact Foundation
- 776 Foundation
- Stanley 1913
- Eleven Eleven Foundation
- Gold House
- Shawn Mendes Foundation
Alongside our individual and anonymous donors. Program and translation partners include UNICEF, CARE International, UNDP, the Smithsonian, Translators Without Borders, Yale Climate Connections, and L’Oréal.
Recognition
- TED CountdownWinner of the TED Countdown Global Ideas Contest
- Forbes 30 Under 30 · BBC 100 WomenPlus Grist 50, the Diana Award, Ashoka, and National Geographic
- In the pressNature Climate Change, The Guardian, The Washington Post, and Newsweek
Governance and safeguarding
Climate Cardinals is governed by the Future Incubator Board of Directors, our 501(c)(3) fiscal sponsor, which provides compliance, strategic oversight, and financial accountability. We are working toward independent 501(c)(3) status.
Advisory Board. Thirty members, among them Hugh Evans of Global Citizen; Sylvia Earle of Mission Blue; Meg Galloway Goldthwaite of The Nature Conservancy; Cameren Bullins of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund; and Ryan Hathaway, formerly of the White House Council on Environmental Quality.
Only employees can access volunteer or participant data, and every employee has passed criminal and child safeguarding background checks. Data is centralized and access-controlled, records are anonymized after three years or on request, and personal data is deleted whenever someone asks.
Our story
It started with one family’s questions, and now runs on staff and systems.
A group of ragtag teenagers turned $500 and a Google Form into one of the world’s largest climate education organizations.
Six years later, we’re a global nonprofit with volunteers registered across 145 countries. FY2025 was our first full year with staff, and in it we launched new programs, grew our budget and team, and accelerated climate action in communities worldwide.
Sophia Kianni, our founder, saw the problem on a middle school trip to Iran, where pollution obscured the stars and temperatures were climbing at more than twice the global average. Her relatives knew little about climate change, because the resources did not exist in their language. She started translating for them, and they became supporters of Iranian environmental defenders.
Realizing what language could unlock, Sophia gathered friends and high school students around the world, and Climate Cardinals began.
Hikaru Wakeel Hayakawa, one of the organization’s first volunteers, became our first full-time Executive Director in 2024, and Climate Cardinals moved from student-led and volunteer-powered to professionally staffed, with the programs, reporting cadence, and financial systems described on this page.
Our values
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People-first. Always.
- We listen to communities and design with them, not for them
- We invest in our team, partners, and communities through trust, feedback, and shared growth
- We build strategic partnerships because lasting systems change is never achieved alone
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Commitment to excellence
- We start from the world we want, not the limits of today, and build toward it
- We don’t avoid hard problems or hold onto what isn’t working. We face both head-on
- We connect people, sectors, and ideas so the whole ecosystem gets stronger, not just our piece of it
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Progress over perfection
- We act before the plan is perfect, then sharpen it as we learn
- We try new methods and bring in new research rather than defaulting to how it’s always been done
- We make learning a system, not an afterthought, so failures teach us as much as wins
Partner with us
We partner with funders who want climate information to actually arrive.
We work with foundations, governments, multilateral institutions, and mission-aligned organizations advancing climate resilience, youth leadership, and equitable access to climate information.
What a $50,000 grant buys
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Fund a program
Back chapters, fellowships, or translation capacity directly. Tell us what you want to fund and we will show you exactly what it buys.
Contact us -
Commission translations
Free for grassroots organizations; low rates for governments, multilateral agencies, and international NGOs. Write to [email protected].
Request a translation -
Services and capacity building
Youth capacity workshops for your programs and staff, and opportunity-sharing with a network of 21,296 volunteers and 85,000+ newsletter subscribers. Write to [email protected].
See our services