Illustration by Harriet Yakub

Together, we’ve taken big strides this year toward our goal of making cogeneration credible, doable, and scalable. 

As this year ends, will you make a donation to support our urgent, bridge-building work?

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In these age-segregated and hyper-polarized times, we:

• Sponsored a community of practice for 167 organizations bringing generations together to fight isolation and loneliness.
• Interviewed 139 leaders, ages 12 to 85, to produce four qualitative studies about how younger people, older people, teenagers, and faith leaders want to work across generations for change, each with a conversation guide.
• Spoke more than 60 times to organizations including, AARP, the YMCA, Youth250, the MIT Age Lab, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Press Institute, the Carnegie Summit on National Service, colleges and universities across the country, and companies like Dyson and Indeed.
• Attracted attention for cogeneration from major media outlets, including The Atlantic, NPR, Wall Street Journal, PBS NewsHour, Marketplace, Vox, Forbes and Teen Vogue.
• Laid the groundwork to make campuses 21st century town centers where older and younger people learn and work together.
• Helped youth-serving organizations prepare teens to work with older adults to strengthen civic life and community. 
• Brought thousands of older and younger people together, virtually and in-person to reimagine a better future for all generations.
• And so much more!

In 2026, we’ll continue to shift the cultural narrative and tell a new story about cogenerational action; support innovators bringing generations together for mutual benefit and social impact; and build an ecosystem of people, organizations and funders to scale this work and sustain it.

We will:

• Deepen our focus on the youngest members of Gen Z – teens. We’ll launch a new community of practice for youth-centered organizations eager to advance cogeneration in civic life, and announce a new fellowship for older and younger leaders who want to develop their public voices together.
• Build a CoGen CoLab, a high-leverage, cost-effective talent accelerator for creating a portfolio of audacious, cogenerational solutions with the potential to change the social norm from generations apart to generations together. A growing group of CoGen Impact Fellows – a diverse, intergenerational roster of compelling thought leaders, changemakers, innovators and creatives – will advance this work.
• Pilot an intergenerational music contest, pairing younger and older musicians to perform side-by-side. Think America’s Got Talent meets the Tracy Chapman/Luke Combs Grammy moment that earned 5 million views and was called “a balm for our sorely divided nation.”
• Make it easier for people to cogenerate. What’s the biggest challenge for folks who want to cogenerate? They can’t find opportunities to work across generations, don’t often come in contact with those older or younger than themselves, and don’t know where or how to get started. We’ll work with strong partners to help the cogen-curious and the cogen-committed move beyond the DIY stage. Together, we’ll build the social infrastructure needed to put cogen opportunities within easy reach.

DONATE NOW →

If our work has helped you live, build, or see the value of a more age-integrated life and society, please donate now. Your partnership will help us take bigger strides in 2026 as we bring generations together for mutual benefit and social impact in every area of daily life. 

We’re grateful to be doing this critical work together. Indeed, it’s the only way forward.

Marc Freedman is the founder of CoGenerate. He and Eunice Lin Nichols are the organization’s Co-CEOs.