About the San Francisco Blog

  • Philanthropy Front and Center-San Francisco is a blog sponsored by the Foundation Center.

    If you have any questions or comments, please contact Janet Camarena, Director, Foundation Center-San Francisco.

    For more information about the Foundation Center, visit our web page.

Current Calendar of Free Programs

May 15, 2008

Check it Out!

Fired_up_6

We have recently added Fired Up Fundraising: Turning Board Passion into Action to our lending library. Gail Perry explains how nonprofit leaders can appeal to board members' dedication to mission and vision in order to create excitement around raising funds. Providing a step-by-step process, Perry outlines her four steps to build a board that is passionate about fundraising:

    1. Focus on mission
    2. Inspire your board members with a new philosophy of fundraising
    3. Ready your board with the right tools and skills
    4. Engage your board members in your fundraising plan

Perry's writing is inspirational and practical. She concludes the preface of her book with the following:

If you create a passion-driven fundraising experience for your board members, you can tackle the myths about fundraising and instill new, more positive approaches that will have them excited about the difference they can make. Your board members will embrace your mission so throughly that they can become agents for change.

You will have them not just willing--but also wanting--to participate in finding expanded resources for your organization. You will rekindle individual passion for your nonprofit's mission and harness that passion into shared fundraising success. You will be able to create a board that is passion-driven--not fearful--about fundraising. A board that will be on fire for the cause, working to make the world a better place, and actually being, as Gandhi said, the change they want to see in the world. (pg. xix)

Here's how to check out this book from the Foundation Center--San Francisco library and a list of other circulating titles.

May 14, 2008

Reality Grantmaking—Get a $1,000 Grant

Come to our program, get a $1,000 grant!  Okay it's not quite that easy but it's not too difficult either.  Here are the details.  As part of Funding for the Environment month in June we're presenting (with DER and AFP-Golden Gate chapter) a Reality Grantmaking session where you can actually see funders in action deciding who gets a grant.  If you want a chance at winning $1,000 and you're with a nonprofit or fiscally-sponsored project with an environmental program, go to the DER web site for the application guidelines.  It's not a big application--in two pages describe your mission, who you serve, how you'll use the grant, and provide a simple project budget.  No attachments are necessary or wanted. Submit your application by 5:00 pm, Monday, June 9 to:

Reality Grantmaking

c/o Cheryl Clarke

478 Green Glen Way

Mill Valley, CA 94941

If your proposal is selected as a finalist it will be reviewed and scored by our expert panel at the program on June 19.  The proposal with the highest score will receive a $1,000 check at the end of the event.  Although only environmental projects can submit requests, grantseekers from all program areas are invited to attend and watch grantmakers review and comment on proposals.  See you there.

To view our exciting Reality Grantmaking event from last year featuring proposals from Health and Human Services organizations, view the video in our events archive. Whether or not you compete for the funds, these sessions provide great insight into the grantmaking process and the details grantmakers notice when reviewing your requests.

May 12, 2008

This Week at the Foundation Center (May 12-16)

Our library is open Monday through Friday free of charge and no appointment is necessary.

Library Hours:

Monday/Tuesday/Thursday/Friday
10:00am-5:00pm
Wednesday
10:00am-8:00pm

May 08, 2008

Osher Foundation Makes Landmark Gift to California Community Colleges

In recent weeks the San Francisco Chronicle has been reporting stories about an encouraging trend among our nation's elite universities that is making it easier for low-, middle- and in some cases upper-middle-income students to afford the high price tag of a college education.  More than three dozen schools, including institutions like Harvard, Stanford, and Yale with robust fundraising operations and large endowments have been able to allocate funds to cap or eliminate loans, tuition or parental contributions for economically disadvantaged students and families. 

While this is good news for those who can meet the entrance requirements of these institutions, some expressed concern that the schools where low- and middle-income students most tend to go can not afford to offer similar tuition breaks.  Public universities tend to have much smaller endowments than privately funded institutions, and community colleges typically do not receive large philanthropic gifts.  So this week's pledge of $50 million from the San Francisco-based Bernard Osher Foundation to the California Community College system to help low-income students at California community colleges is well timed to address these concerns since the system serves 2.6 million students each year, many of them low-income.  Since part of it is structured as a challenge grant it also signals a likely increase in foundation and individual donations to California's community colleges.  Here are more details, from our own Philanthropy News Digest, about what is believed to be the largest donation ever made to a private-institution in the United States:

The gift will be used to create an endowment for the 109-school system that will be managed by the Foundation for California Community Colleges in Sacramento. Half of the pledge will be paid immediately, while the additional $25 million will be dispensed over the next three years while FCCC works to raise an additional $50 million. According to Osher president Mary Bitterman, the foundation has given millions to universities over the past few years, but community colleges need significantly more financial assistance.

With 2.6 million students, California's community-college system is the world's largest public college system. The new endowment is expected to support 1,250 scholarships in 2009 and eventually provide 5,000 per year. The foundation is expected to announce an additional $20 million grant to several California public universities to help community-college transfer students.

According to FCCC president Paul Lanning, potential donors to community colleges simply haven't been asked to provide support. "[The Osher gift] shows that we warrant public support," he said. "There's a very clear disparity between what we do and how we're funded. We can't keep relying on public funding."

Krupnick, Matt. "Endowment to Aid Needy Students." San Jose Mercury News 5/05/08

Sturrock, Carrie. "Biggest Gift Ever for Community Colleges." San Francisco Chronicle 5/7/08

May 06, 2008

This Week at the Foundation Center (May 5-9)

Our library is open Monday through Friday free of charge and no appointment is necessary.

Library Hours:

Monday/Tuesday/Thursday/Friday
10:00am-5:00pm
Wednesday
10:00am-8:00pm

May 01, 2008

Get Sticky!

Since I am based in the Foundation Center’s San Francisco office, I was fortunate to not have to travel very far to attend the 2008 GEO (Grantmakers for Effective Organizations) annual conference, which took place last month.  The conference, “Ideas to Action: Grantmaker Practices that Improve Nonprofit Results,” covered much ground.  In reviewing my notes to decide what to highlight here, I think one of the most compelling (or should I say “sticky”) programs that is probably most broadly applicable to the widest audience was the conference keynote on the concept of “stickiness.”

The kick-off of the conference was a keynote on the virtues of “sticky” ideas, and featured Chip Heath, co-author of Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die.  It was a very entertaining and thought-provoking opening which started with urban myths that many of us believe and have stuck with us, despite the fact that they are false such as: we must all drink 8 glasses of water per day, or we only use 10% of our brain power on any given day, or a chilling urban myth popular among the college set about accepting a drink from an attractive stranger and ending up victim of an organ donor swindle (yep, not your ordinary philanthropy conference presentation).  And then he outlined why many of our nonprofit or philanthropy communications strategies are probably miserable failures as far as having that same sort of lasting power that urges people to “tell a friend” or to even just understand what it is you just explained your organization does. 

Heath recommends these elements for effective organization messaging:

  • Simple
  • Unexpected
  • Concrete
  • Credible
  • Emotional
  • Stories

Of course for most foundations and nonprofit organizations, our mission statements and communications tend to be:

  • Complex
  • Predictable
  • Abstract
  • Ambitious/unrealistic
  • Cerebral
  • Facts

Heath provided several compelling examples of nonprofit-speak mission statements and how groups had taken his advice to shape them into more “sticky” terms.  One that has stuck with me is when he described a typical mission statement from an organization that works with children with learning disabilities and said that its mission statement was the usual fare about working to nurture language acquisition skills of children with learning disabilities, and how the average person would tune that out.  After working with Heath one of the ways in which this organization now describes their work with the public is to say: “Our organization exists so that every mother can hear her child say the word “mommy.” 

Heath then described a couple of barriers to “stickiness” that may be particularly troubling for foundations and the nonprofit sector to overcome.  One, which sounds like it could be a “b” movie, is the “curse of knowledge.”  As a sector, we are apparently known for our exceedingly tedious ability to look at issues from complex and nuanced vantage points, speak in jargon, and rapidly make people’s eyes glaze over with endless amounts of information. 

And in addition to the curse of knowledge, equally troubling is “decision paralysis,” which is the phenomenon that when you give your audience multiple options as opposed to one they are most likely to pick none.  So what’s a complex organization that deals with addressing several nuanced issues in our society in a data-driven way with multiple plans of action supposed to do?  Tell stories, Heath advises.  Stories are memorable, and have a power to create a “springboard” in your audience’s mind allowing them to spin their own story parallel with yours. 

So, beware the curse of knowledge, keep it simple, and find emotional hooks by illustrating your organization’s work through stories. 

Has anyone out there used the Make it Stick principles to come up with a sticky statement illustrating your organization’s good work?  Please share.

-Janet Camarena
Director, SF Office
The Foundation Center

April 25, 2008

Welcome to the Foundation Center-San Francisco's New Blog

Spring is a wonderful time for starting new projects and planting the seeds for what we hope will flourish and grow throughout the rest of the year.  So it is in this springtime spirit of grassroots growth, abundant nurture and bountiful harvest that we embark on our philanthropy blogging journey from the San Francisco outpost of the Foundation Center.   We will use this space to highlight regional philanthropy news and local nonprofit happenings, successful grantseekers whom we can learn from, tools you can use in our library and online, and to notify you about upcoming programs or highlight lessons learned from recent programs.

                                           ***

Here is a list of some of our newly released tools, resources, and upcoming programs:

  • According to the our new report, Key Facts on Corporate Foundations, giving by corporate foundations increased 6.6 percent in 2007 to an estimated $4.4 billion.
  • The Spanish translation of our classic Guide to Proposal Writing, Guía para escribir propuestas, was just released.
  • The Foundation Center will offer Funding for the Environment programming throughout the month of June in all of our five offices.  Gain insight into your local environmental funding community and learn about incorporating green practices into your nonprofit operations. View the Environment Month calendar for San Francisco.
  • Over the next couple of months we are bringing our popular Proposal Writing Basics class to nine cities throughout California in partnership with the James Irvine Foundation to prepare arts organizations to apply to the Irvine Foundation's new Creative Connections Fund.  Please see the Irvine web site for more details about the Fund. For more information and to register for the free training programs, visit our web site.

                                           ***

Featured Grantmaker of the Week:  Yesterday Target's San Francisco Bay Area region hosted a community celebration for its grantees at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, which reminded us about their local contributions to corporate philanthropy, upcoming deadlines, and how nice it is when grantmakers stop what they are doing to take a moment to thank their grantees for their hard work and dedication.  In 2007, Target provided $3 million to nonprofit organizations in the nine county Bay Area, and an additional $880,074 to K-12 schools in this region.  Target is known for its commitment to giving 5% of its income to its communities, a unique mark of distinction in corporate philanthropy.  Target is now accepting grant applications online through May 31, 2008.  The Target grant program focuses on three areas: Arts, Early Childhood Reading, and Family Violence Prevention.  Visit Target.com/grants to complete and submit an application or for more information. 

                                           ***

So, some seeds have been planted here, and we hope you will help us by making this a community garden project of sorts.  Do you have a grantseeking success story to share or local grantmaking announcements to feature?  Let us know via comments or contact Janet Camarena at jfc@foundationcenter.org

Happy Spring Seeding Everyone!

-Janet Camarena, Director, SF Office

Subscribe

Bookmark and Share

Foundation Center - San Francisco: New Acquisitions

PND - Philanthropy News Digest