Having a strong pool of well educated students is critical for an innovation-driven company such as Lilly. That's why we're a proud supporter of The Mind Trust, an Indianapolis-based nonprofit organization focused on ensuring every Indianapolis student has the opportunity to receive an excellent education.

Today, The Mind Trust announced it is investing $2 million to help launch new public charter schools in Indianapolis through its Charter School Incubator program. The Lilly Foundation provided $1 million toward this program, part of a larger overall grant of $2.5 million we made last year to The Mind Trust.

The inaugural recipients of The Mind Trust grants are the George and Veronica Phalen Leadership Academies and Christel House International -- who received $1 million apiece. The awards will help these innovative organizations start or expand their networks of public charter schools in Indianapolis. Both organizations have outstanding track records of dramatically improving academic results among low-income students. You can read about them here and watch the brief video of the program and winners included in this post.

The Mind Trust's Charter School Incubator, launched in October 2011, is unique nationally because of the large amount of the awards and the requirement that teams start multiple charter schools, not just one.

We salute the George and Veronica Phalen Leadership Academies and Christel House International, which together plan to launch up to nine schools serving 6,000 students over the next ten years. They were selected out of a highly competitive pool of 35 teams from 18 states that applied for the first round of awards.The Mind Trust's rigorous, four-month review process included 15 education, finance, and school-governance experts from across the country.

The application process for the next round of awards is now open. The deadline is November 2, and the next round of winners will be selected in February 2013.