Crocs, Inc. Supports UNICEF
Equipping young people with 21st century skills to tackle societal challenges through innovation and entrepreneurship.
Partners since 2025
Crocs, Inc. is partnering with UNICEF in support of UNICEF’s UPSHIFT initiative. UPSHIFT equips young people with 21st century skills to tackle societal challenges through innovation and entrepreneurship. Created by UNICEF, its curriculum, mentorship, and training program prepares young people to take charge of their future as entrepreneurs, employees, and citizens. As part of its Purpose to Create a More Comfortable World for All, Crocs, Inc. has an ambition to address barriers to unlock opportunities for all communities to be safe, resilient and thriving. UNICEF’s UPSHIFT initiative is well equipped to do that and by offering its support, Crocs, Inc. hopes to help UPSHIFT reach even more young people around the world.
Too often, young people around the world lack access to the education, experience, and employment they need for personal and professional development. Without adequate support, training, and resources, they can feel unable to make meaningful contributions to their communities. By equipping youth with essential skills like problem-solving, creativity, collaboration, leadership, and communication, UPSHIFT prepares them to take charge of their present and future as entrepreneurs, employees, and global citizens.
Driven by UNICEF’s mandate ‘For Every Child’, UPSHIFT is committed to taking an equitable and inclusive approach to skills development. 56% of all UPSHIFT participants are girls and young women, and the program can adapt to meet the needs of diverse and marginalized communities – including youth with disabilities in Ghana; migrants and refugees in Egypt; climate-affected communities in Guatemala; young people not in employment, education or training (NEET) in Kyrgyzstan; ethnic minorities in Montenegro; remote communities in the Maldives; conflict-affected youth in Ukraine; and residents of monastic institutions in Bhutan.
UPSHIFT offers a comprehensive journey that combines skills workshops, mentorship, and an entrepreneurial challenge. The skills workshops instill grit, confidence, resilience, and determination, while enhancing participants' teamwork, problem-solving, and decision-making. In the first phase, participants learn to analyze and understand challenges they have identified within their communities, and work to develop products or services to address these issues. Teams then pitch their locally-driven, innovative solutions as part of an entrepreneurial challenge. The winning teams proceed to phase two, where they receive seed funding and further mentoring to support the development and even implementation of their solutions. UNICEF looks for opportunities to introduce winning teams to local and national stakeholders – including entrepreneurial networks, and private and public sector ecosystems – to enable them to build their own networks and advance their projects.
UPSHIFT operates in 56 countries worldwide, with over 145 million learning hours completed by over 5.2 million young people who completed a learning journey with UPSHIFT. With the support of Crocs, UPSHIFT will be able to accelerate its scale and reach over one million young people in 2025.
This work supports Crocs, Inc. in achieving its goal to positively impact more than 3 million young people by the end of 2027. Crocs, Inc. will do this through its recently announced STEP UP TO GREATNESS community platform impact platform, which supports young people to gain the STEP UP SKILLS they need to build confidence, access new opportunities, unlock their potential and be a positive force in their communities.
“We believe in partnering with organizations with impactful missions such as UNICEF’s UPSHIFT initiative and are thrilled to help them equip young people to develop meaningful solutions for themselves and their communities to thrive,” said Deanna Bratter, Chief Sustainability Officer, Crocs, Inc. “By leveraging our partnerships and activating our brands where they add the most value, we can increase our impact and make a real difference for the next generation.”
UNICEF USA does not endorse any company, brand, product or service.