Our founder, Christine DeLeon “CDL” imagined the future of education on a post-it note during a 4.0 Schools workshop and co-founded a grassroots education initiative called Talk to Action to support other leaders build out new ideas.

In Fall 2016, she founds Moonshot edVentures in Denver.

Through a series of coffee shop chats and word-of-mouth referrals, CDL recruits the first cohort of Moonshot Fellows. Sixteen education leaders and social entrepreneurs come together for the inaugural Moonshot Fellowship.

Plus, the Moonshot team expands to a team of two!

Moonshot hosts 30+ more Fellows with Cohort 2 in 2018 and Cohort 3 in 2019. Moonshot Alumni take their ventures to the next level by opening schools, starting programs, and receiving follow-on funding and program support.

Moonshot gets an office space of their own at 3840 York Street in Denver.

Covid-19 strikes: the end of Cohort 3 transitions to virtual student pilots, and Cohort 4 begins all virtual in Fall 2020. Despite the pandemic, Moonshot continues to grow: Moonshot launches two Residency Programs and runs a successful Shoot for the Moon Challenge which raises over $200,000 for 12 Fellows and their ventures. For Cohort 5 in Fall 2021, Moonshot was back in-person!

The team evolves, too! Moonshot grows to a team of four; CDL transitions from her role as CEO, with Kat Ling succeeding her.

With Cohort 6, Moonshot hits a milestone: 100 Fellows! The team grows to six, and Moonshot releases a Year-5 Impact Report.

In 2023, Moonshot took a pause in the Fellowship cycle to review learnings from the first five years, strategically plan for the next five, and evolve and develop our programming. In 2024, Moonshot launches a new version of the Fellowship called the Moonshot Innovation Space.