$4M grant fuels KC TechBridge's future path

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Sep 10

Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation Invests $4 Million in KC Tech Council Initiative to Strengthen Kansas City’s Tech Hiring

Grant will fund KC TechBridge’s new Technology Hiring Center of Excellence, connecting tech career opportunities with local talent

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (September 10, 2026) – The KC Tech Council (KCTC) announced a three-year $4 million Project Grant from the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation to establish a Technology Hiring Center of Excellence, part of KCTC’s regional tech talent initiative, KC TechBridge.

Launched in early 2025, KC TechBridge will work directly with Kansas City employers to build more effective, skills-based hiring practices for regional tech talent seeking their first job in the industry.

Technology jobs span nearly every sector of the Kansas City regional economy, offer above-average wages and increasingly provide multiple pathways to entry, making them a key driver of economic mobility for the region.

“Through months of listening to employers, educators and talent across Kansas City, one thing became abundantly clear: we don’t have a tech pipeline problem, we have a connectivity problem,” said Kara Lowe, president and CEO of KC Tech Council. “KC TechBridge is about fixing the point where talent and opportunity too often fail to meet. This investment gives Kansas City the opportunity to turn the talent we’re already developing into careers, and the hiring needs employers already have into opportunity.”

KC TechBridge builds on engagement with more than 1,400 stakeholders across Kansas City’s tech ecosystem. Through the Hiring Center of Excellence, the KC Tech Council will work with employers to develop and test clearer job requirements, standardize interview and assessment tools and build employer-informed, work-based learning opportunities. Progress will be measured by employer adoption and its impact on hiring outcomes, with the goal of scaling successful approaches region-wide.

Finding great talent isn’t the hard part; it’s whether our hiring processes are built to recognize it. This grant lets us fix that connection point. When employers align on clearer, skills-based hiring practices, we turn Kansas City’s talent pipeline into a talent pathway,” said George Brooks, KC Tech Council board member and founder & CEO of Crema.

The grant is part of the Kauffman Foundation’s broader commitment to strengthening the systems that shape economic mobility across Kansas City, with additional Project Grant opportunities opening later this fall.

“These investments also reinforce something we’re seeing more clearly across our work: the systems that shape economic mobility are deeply connected,” said Allison Greenwood, chief impact and strategy officer at the Kauffman Foundation. “Education, workforce and entrepreneurship do not operate in separate lanes, and neither do the challenges people encounter as they build their futures. What we learn through one strategic priority or grant pathway can strengthen our understanding of another. That gives us more opportunities to connect ideas, invest in promising approaches at the right scale and help build a stronger regional ecosystem for economic mobility.”