Building a Safer Digital Future Together.
When a young person reaches out for help online, the right first connection can shape what happens next. Founding partners help ensure a trusted human is there to meet that moment, funding access, advancing research, and building the prevention infrastructure that makes early, human connection possible for more young people.
Partnership
Built together
Funding access and prevention infrastructure.
A founding commitment shapes what prevention can become.
The Chaperone Initiative is a prevention-focused, nonprofit youth-safety effort built on operational peer-support infrastructure from Chaperone Health, with research and oversight through the University of Illinois Chicago. Founding partners help move this model from early implementation toward independently evaluated, scalable prevention. Outcomes and scale claims are validation pending.
Expand funded youth access
Partner support extends sponsored, funded access to defined youth populations (schools, healthcare pathways, communities, and implementation cohorts) so more young people can reach a trained Peer Chaperone at the moment human connection matters most.
Advance independent research
Early support fuels rigorous evaluation through the University of Illinois Chicago, building the evidence base for early, human-led prevention and ensuring the model is measured honestly and improved continuously.
Build prevention infrastructure
Beyond any single program, partners help build durable infrastructure: training, safeguarding practices, technology that supports (never replaces) Peer Chaperones, and the operational backbone that lets trusted human support reach youth reliably.
Demonstrate a scalable model
Early institutional partners help prove that prevention through trusted human connection can be implemented, measured, and replicated, creating a credible blueprint for funders, health systems, and public partners to adopt and extend.
The Chaperone Initiative is not therapy, clinical treatment, diagnosis, crisis counseling, or emergency response. We lead with trained Peer Chaperones and trusted human connection; technology supports and assists our people and never replaces Peer Chaperones, clinicians, therapists, or crisis services.
Credible foundations already in place.
The Initiative brings together academic research and operational peer-support delivery, pairing independent evaluation with the infrastructure to act.
University of Illinois Chicago (UIC)
Provides research, independent evaluation, and academic oversight for the Initiative, helping ensure the prevention model is studied rigorously, measured transparently, and grounded in evidence as it grows.
Chaperone Health
Supplies the operational peer-support infrastructure behind the Initiative: the training, safeguarding practices, and human-led delivery that connect vulnerable youth with trained Peer Chaperones.
Partner descriptions reflect high-level, approved relationships and are presented as draft pending review.
The moment is urgent, and the people to meet it are already here.
Founding partners are supporting a model built on real infrastructure, not starting from a blank page. They are joining an effort that pairs a clear-eyed reading of the moment with an academic-and-operational team already in place to act on it.
Why now
A generation is growing up online, and the first time a young person reaches out is often the moment that decides what comes next. Most support arrives only after a situation has escalated. Prevention through early, trusted human connection is the gap, and the window to build that infrastructure thoughtfully, before patterns harden, is open now.
Why this team
The Initiative pairs independent research and academic oversight from the University of Illinois Chicago with proven, human-led peer-support delivery from Chaperone Health. That combination, evidence on one side and operational capacity to act on the other, is rare, and it is what lets a founding commitment translate into measured, real-world prevention rather than a pilot that stalls.
Characterizations of the moment and team reflect the Initiative's current direction; outcome and effectiveness claims are validation pending.
Founding partners shape decisions later partners only inherit.
Joining early is not just earlier funding. It is a seat at the table while the foundational work is underway. Founding partners can help inform early priorities, implementation cohorts, and field-facing questions while research methods, safeguarding standards, and youth-safety practices remain governed through the Initiative's oversight structure.
The research questions
Help prioritize which outcomes the independent evaluation with UIC measures first, so the evidence base answers the questions that matter most to the field.
Safeguarding priorities
Help surface the questions and priorities that inform safeguarding practice as it scales, while trust-and-governance standards remain set through the Initiative's oversight structure.
Who gets reached first
Help inform which youth populations, communities, and care pathways funded access reaches first, and how implementation cohorts are defined.
For detail on evaluation, see Research; for safeguarding and governance, see Trust & Safety. The ways partner organizations inform the model are developed together with each partner and are presented as draft pending review.
Partners who believe the first encounter matters.
We are assembling a select group of mission-aligned funders, providers, and community partners to help build prevention infrastructure for vulnerable youth, organized into the clusters below.
Philanthropy
Foundations
Mission-driven philanthropy investing in youth safety, mental wellbeing, and scalable prevention.
Family offices
Families and major philanthropists seeking measurable, high-leverage impact for the next generation.
Healthcare & Education
Healthcare organizations
Health systems integrating early, human-led prevention into youth care pathways.
Children's hospitals
Pediatric leaders extending trusted support to young patients and families beyond the clinic.
School districts
Educators bringing prevention and trusted connection to students where they spend their days.
Community & Public Sector
Community organizations
Trusted local institutions ready to bring funded access to the youth and families they serve.
Faith-based organizations
Congregations and faith networks extending care and connection to vulnerable young people.
Public-sector agencies
Government and public-health partners scaling prevention across geographies and populations.
Research & Youth Safety
Research institutions
Academic and research partners contributing to the evidence base for human-led prevention.
Child-safety organizations
Specialists in safeguarding who help strengthen prevention practice and protection standards.
Youth advocacy organizations
Advocates working to put young people's safety and voice at the center of digital life.
Corporate & Social Impact
Corporate sponsors
Companies advancing social impact and digital wellbeing through visible, credible commitment.
Help define a safer online future for the next generation.
A select group of launch-phase partners will help expand youth access, advance research, support innovation, build prevention infrastructure, demonstrate scalable intervention models, and create a safer online environment for the youth who come after us.
Foundation grant
Multi-year philanthropic support that expands funded access and underwrites independent evaluation.
Family office / major gift
A leadership commitment from a family or major philanthropist to anchor the founding cohort.
Healthcare integration
Embedding early, human-led prevention into pediatric and youth care pathways within a health system.
Corporate sponsorship
A credible, visible social-impact commitment that helps fund access for a defined youth population.
Research collaboration
Joining the evaluation effort with UIC to strengthen the evidence base for prevention at scale.
Public-sector & community
Implementation with public agencies and community partners to reach defined geographies and cohorts.
Partnership structures are illustrative and shaped together with each partner. Funded access is framed for defined youth populations, communities, schools, healthcare pathways, and implementation cohorts.
Let's start the conversation.
Tell us about your organization and the populations you serve. We'll follow up to explore how a founding partnership could expand funded youth access, advance research, and build prevention infrastructure together.
A direct conversation
A direct conversation with the Initiative team, with no obligation.
Shaped around your mission
A partnership shaped around your mission, populations, and goals.
Transparency throughout
Transparency on research, safeguarding, and how funds expand access.
If you or a young person needs immediate help, please contact the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. The Chaperone Initiative is not a crisis or emergency service, and we never gate anyone in crisis behind a form.