MemoryFox Unveils The Nine 2025 Foxie Award Winners
2025 was a milestone year for MemoryFox. Originally built in 2017 as a tool to capture the lived experiences of elderly family members, Founder & CEO Chris Miano quickly realized that the simplicity of the tool could make a massive impact by allowing community stories to be shared in an ethical way. Since then, MemoryFox’s mission has been to elevate the stories of real human beings, ethically and authentically.
As of this year, MemoryFox has:
- Helped 650+ mission-driven organizations bring their missions to life.
- Collected and stored over 250,000 photos, videos, and written testimonials.
- Voiced the importance of ethical storytelling through hosting the quarterly “Narratives with Integrity” webinar series and by compiling the 3rd rendition of the Ethical Storytelling Report, released in December 2025.
To celebrate this incredible year of growth, MemoryFox is proud to announce the nine winners of the 3rd annual Foxie Awards. As we unveil the winners, we invite you to join us in celebrating the storytelling spirit of all the wonderful mission-driven organizations we have the privilege to work alongside.
The Foxie Awards recognize outstanding storytelling achievements in eight distinct categories:
- Storyteller of the Year (Organization and Individual)
- Photo of the Year
- Video Creator of the Year
- Story Page of the Year
- Campaign of the Year
- Creative Storyteller of the Year
- Ethical Storyteller of the Year
- Rising Star
These awards not only honor the recipients and pay tribute to the honorable mentions, but also serve as a testament to the diverse and inspiring stories that are integral in shaping the nonprofit sector as a whole.
This year, we have proudly added a new award: Rising Star. The addition of this new award is a testament to the growth within our community of storytellers, of which we feel uniquely honored to have a firsthand look.
Meet the 2025 Foxie Award Winners
Storyteller of the Year Winner – Organization: United Way Suncoast
The most prestigious honor, and subsequently the most challenging to designate, this award recognizes the organization whose body of work is exemplary through every step of MemoryFox’s “Collect, Organize & Share” process. This organization’s commitment to storytelling is unmatched – as seen through their consistency and dedication to collecting community stories that are unique, widespread and impactful all year long.
United Way Suncoast has a vision to eternally lead, convene, and collaborate with their communities – as they’ve done for more than 100 years – to meet the most pressing issues of the day, creating better tomorrows. In 2025, they launched 175 unique story collection campaigns – some for special events and others that have become annual traditions. To date, their team has collected over 5,500 stories, each one reflecting the power of their mission in action and the impact of community stewardship. Many were shared as standalone content, while others were brought together into Story Pages like this one for their “Stuff the Bus” event, creatively showcasing how their mission is transforming lives across the region, mobilizing communities to action so all can thrive.
Storyteller of the Year Winner – Individual: Lisa Rapaszky of Greater Cleveland Neighborhood Centers Association
The pinnacle of recognition, this award honors an individual’s commitment to ethical storytelling and uplifting community voices. The individual storyteller of the year routinely goes above and beyond in their commitment to building a culture of storytelling within their community, inevitably leaving an enduring impact on the MemoryFox community.
Lisa Rapaszky is the Development Manager at Greater Cleveland Neighborhood Centers Association, where their mission is to support and strengthen education for children, families, and older adults, and advocate for the social, economic, and political well-being of Greater Clevelanders. Lisa is dedicated to her craft; she approaches her work with an inquisitive mind and great enthusiasm for her content goals. She’s constantly pushing herself to be the best storyteller she can be, and is a regular at the MemoryFox monthly Campfire Community gatherings, invested in learning everything she can from fellow MemoryFox storytellers to fortify her own knowledge and identify new opportunities for creativity and experimentation with story collection.
This year, she crafted 14 campaigns, the most notable being the one tied to their NextGen Leadership summer program. This photo was taken by a middle school student participant; with a focus on environmentalism in Cleveland, the program develops employment skills as the students are paid a stipend, attend field trips, and host guest speakers from local agencies. At the program’s end, they publish a bound newsletter that features their photography and writing.
Support Neighborhood Centers Association
Photo of the Year Winner: Every Kid Sports
A testament to the power of a single image, this award acknowledges the organization whose work has left an indelible mark by telling a compelling story in a single frame. The MemoryFox team chose the following photo as the 2025 Photo of the Year:
Every Kid Sports believes that every kid deserves the chance to play® and that sports are so much more than a game: They’re a gateway to life’s greatest learnings. Their team supports life through access to youth sports and ensures that financial barriers don’t stand in the way of life. Understanding that youth sports are a powerful force for shaping one’s life, they bring health to life by encouraging physical activity and emotional leadership, hope to life by showing kids that they can achieve anything with effort, and possibility to life by opening doors to new opportunities.
Every Kid Sports’ MemoryFox Story Bank is overflowing with over 950 compelling images from kids who have participated in their programs. And while it was challenging to choose just one image, the spirit of competition and pride in achievement shines through in this photo, showcasing why their mission matters beyond the court or the playing field.
Photo of the Year Honorable Mentions: Illinois College, Sierra Health Foundation, The Community Foundation Martin – St. Lucie, Thumb Community Health Partnerships
Video Creator of the Year Winner: PAN Foundation
It’s never been more important to share nonprofit impact stories via video, and part of the MemoryFox culture is educating nonprofits on the impact of showing their mission in action, not just talking about it. Highlighting the dynamic world of video storytelling, this award honors the organization that created an exceptional collection of videos this year by transforming their MemoryFox-collected content into compelling video stories that engage, celebrate, advocate, and inspire their community.
This year’s Video of the Year Winner is PAN Foundation, for their ”Mental Health Awareness” video. As a leading charitable foundation and healthcare advocacy organization, their mission is to accelerate access to affordable, equitable healthcare through financial assistance, advocacy, and education. By using an integrated approach to collect stories through their website, external communications, and direct connections, the PAN Foundation team gathered over 470 stories across 40+ story-collection campaigns. They then transformed this content into powerful composite videos.
Video of the Year Honorable Mentions: North Carolina Community Foundation, SEEC, The Cape Cod Foundation
Story Page of the Year Winner: “Harmonies for Health”, by Urban Health Partnerships
Recognizing the importance of combining storytelling through multiple individuals and expertly displaying them, this award celebrates the MemoryFox Story Page that has seamlessly woven a collection of stories into a cohesive and visually stunning narrative.
Urban Health Partnership’s mission is to invest in its communities by co-designing sustainable change and promoting health and well-being across the life span. The winning “Harmonies for Health” Story Page highlights their expertise in celebrating community events. By inviting virtual participation through a dynamic flow of content, they emphasized inclusion and access, and encouraged engagement, fundraising, and deeper connections with their network.
What sets this Story Page apart is the interactive elements: buttons and links allow viewers to take action, turning celebration into meaningful involvement.
Support Urban Health Partnerships
Story Page of the Year Honorable Mentions: RE:IMAGINE ATL, The Baum School of Art
Campaign of the Year Winner: Maymont Foundation
Embracing the power of community storytelling, this award commends the organization that crafted an exceptional content collection campaign that inspired an enormous amount of engagement amongst their supporters, staff, and volunteers.
In 2025 as Maymont began their celebration of 100 years as a public park and museum, they endeavored to tap into their robust list of patrons and supporters to collect stories of 1926 through present day. This oral history project was intended to preserve and share the story of this special place, and stories shared became a part of Maymont’s archives to be used for research, promotion, or in support of the 100th Anniversary celebrations.
The team highlighted their “Maymont Moments” campaign on their website, displayed through four different angles – from Easter memories to wedding moments to reflections of their garden grounds. This targeted approach proved to be wildly successful, tallying over 800 photos and videos and great enthusiasm from members of their community.
Campaign of the Year Honorable Mentions: Hamilton/Burlington SPCA, Wounded Warrior Project
Creative Storyteller of the Year Winner: Horizons Hampton Roads
The award for Creative Storyteller of the Year celebrates a storytelling organization that uses innovative, thoughtful ways to capture and share stories from their community all year long. A creative storyteller not only uses out-of-the-box thinking when creating MemoryFox campaigns, but also is committed to improving their storytelling techniques over time. These creative tactics include using unique prompts and highlighting perspectives of different community members within their nonprofit.
For more than 25 years, Horizons Hampton Roads, based in Virginia and serving the Norfolk, Virginia Beach, and Portsmouth communities, has fostered the potential of thousands of local children, ensuring they are better prepared to succeed in school and in life. They advance educational equity by building long-term partnerships with students, families, communities, and schools to create experiences outside of school that inspire the joy of learning.
What stands out is the exceptional job they did building initial, small opportunities for story collection success, which immediately fed into a massive influx of content. Their primary goal was to “capture a day in the life of Horizons”; this simple idea started with 3 campaigns for their 3 sites where they made it as easy as possible to document the essence of Horizons from various perspectives. Within a short few months, they amassed more than 8,000 pieces of content from hundreds of contributors, gamifying their collection efforts and creating a space for friendly competition and internal visibility. The team turned these submissions into beautiful donor thank you cards, enrollment flyers, and advertisements, and it fueled all the content for their annual report.
Support Horizons Hampton Roads
Creative Storyteller of the Year Honorable Mentions: CdLS Foundation, The Brethren Church
Ethical Storyteller of the Year Winner: Empowerment Plan
Ethical storytelling is more than simply collecting consent; it is both a process and a set of values. Ethical storytelling means practicing intentionality by respecting the dignity of storytellers and authentically listening to your community. It is also a process of continuous improvement.
Many of our MemoryFox storytellers have made a commitment to learning – by attending ethical storytelling panels or explicitly working with our customer success team to make improvements – but the Ethical Storyteller of the Year award is given to an organization that has truly gone above and beyond to teach other organizations as well.
MemoryFox is proud to announce that this has been awarded to Empowerment Plan – a Detroit-based nonprofit that creates pathways to employment and supportive services for individuals experiencing homelessness, supporting their transition into empowered stability. Employees manufacture innovative sleeping bag coats that are distributed to those in need while gaining income, skills, and long-term financial independence.
Their team exemplifies the core principles of ethical, empowered choice in storytelling. When redefining their past approach to collecting stories, they realized:
“Some clients shared that they hadn’t always felt full ownership or respect in how their stories were used. There’s almost always other vulnerabilities wrapped up into this, including sharing identities without consent. We’re now rebuilding trust. We’ve moved to a much more purposeful approach to gathering stories. We started by hosting listening sessions and by writing (and still writing) our ethical storytelling SOP. The biggest focus is on informed consent, being really intentional about what we want to capture and why. And being proactive instead of reactive.” -The Empowerment Plan team
Ethical Storyteller of the Year Honorable Mentions: I Would Rather Be Reading, Kindred Matters, Merit America
Rising Star Winner: Ainsley Jones of Hope Scarves
In a nod to exciting things on the horizon, the Rising Star award recognizes a new MemoryFox storyteller who has made a big splash in their first year, who exhibits exciting potential, great storytelling acumen and ambition, and who we expect to do magnificent work in the years to come.
MemoryFox is proud to designate Ainsley Jones, Director of Strategy & Organizational Growth at Hope Scarves, as the inaugural winner of the Rising Star award. Since joining forces with MemoryFox to amplify stories that honor the mission of Hope Scarves, Ainsley has consistently championed hope stories from every angle—supporting both within Hope Scarves and across his personal and professional communities. He’s deeply reflective, yet eager to implement steady, sustainable change to create meaningful progress.
We had the honor of meeting Ainsley at the Nonprofit Storytelling Conference and found his thoughtful approach to authentic storytelling to be honest, refreshing, and inspiring. He stays centered around ethical storytelling, honoring consent, and using video not as a marketing tool but as a way to preserve, elevate, and humanize the voices of people facing cancer and to fuel partnerships. Most recently, Ainsley brought his storytelling commitment to LinkedIn, where he shared:
“At Hope Scarves, we’re making space for people to name hope in their own words—honestly, imperfectly, and in community.
If you feel moved, we’d love for you to share what hope means to you here:
Your words might be exactly what someone else needs today.”
This is what it truly means to rise as a star storyteller. Ainsley, we celebrate you for engaging your community in ways that uplift, honor strength, and encourage participation through genuine invitation and sincerity.
Campfire Community Presenters
As we close out the year, we’d like to share additional gratitude for the 24 MemoryFox storytellers who came forward to present at our nine Campfire Community customer gatherings in 2025. Month by month, these individuals stepped into the spotlight to reveal their greatest successes, their favorite storytelling strategies and campaign tactics, and their best tricks for engagement. Exploring their tangible examples together became the human-first approach to learning that our community was craving, and this collaborative energy quickly evolved into a space dedicated to encouraging other storytellers to learn how they too can replicate similar techniques and implement creative ideas at their own missions.
The full list of presenting customers can be viewed here, along with this recap video that looks back on how it all began and what we accomplished in 2025. Thank you to everyone who was a part of this – presenter or attendee. Together, this community built something bright and real.
About MemoryFox
MemoryFox is proud to be the premier technology solution for impact-driven organizations to bring their missions to life. A dazzling culmination of impact, creativity, and visual storytelling across the full spectrum of missions and sizes, the eight 2025 Foxie winners represent storytelling excellence in the nonprofit sector.
To learn more about MemoryFox, we invite you to explore our new subscription offerings or invest 30 minutes with our team to:
- Determine if adding MemoryFox to your toolkit would be beneficial to your organization.
- Talk through your storytelling process and identify ways to apply an ethical framework.
- Show you a brief presentation of our platform and the resources we provide.
