PhilanTopic

Weekend Link Roundup (September 1-2, 2012)

Our weekly roundup of new and noteworthy posts from and about the nonprofit sector....

Fundraising

Network for Good's Katya Andresen shares a letter from one of her blog readers, who urges development directors to "make sure your donors are really getting the prompt thanks they deserve."

International Development

On the Gates Foundation's Impatient Optimists blog, Ari Katz describes how public libraries are bolstering development efforts in impoverished communities. Among other things, Katz writes, libraries empower women, expand awareness of and solutions to public health problems, and help to bridge the education gap in many developing countries.

Nonprofit Management

On her blog, Beth Kanter announces the forthcoming publication of her second book, Measuring the Networked Nonprofit, which she co-authored with KD Paine. Among other things, the book presents "a framework called 'Crawl, Walk, Run, Fly' to help nonprofits figure out what...steps they need to take to get to the next level of networked nonprofit practice. It is designed to help them understand and measure the nature of the change process as they move through it." We're looking forward to reading the book and learning more.

Philanthropy

In a post on her Philanthropy 2173 blog, Lucy Bernholz argues that because foundations don't have nearly enough money to solve the problems laid at their doorsteps, the foundation application process is a mess. "From the outside looking in," writes Bernholz,

foundations appear to be making it as hard as possible to apply for funding. They all have their own forms. The language about what they seek to accomplish is jargon-riddled and as opaque as possible. Some won't take unsolicited proposals at all. Others require several steps of inquiry before agreeing to receive an application.

Wouldn't it be better, she adds, "[i]f foundation application procedures were designed to help them find the right projects and help applicants find the funding they need (even if it's not going to be from that foundation?) Or if applicants could get guidance and help to improve their proposals?" As an example of what that might look like, Bernholz points to American Public Media's Transom site, which leverages the interactive nature and global reach of the Internet to channel new work and voices to public radio.

Social Media

On the Foundation Center's Transparency Talk blog, Mike Painter, senior program officer at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, shares some of the thinking behind the foundation's community engagement efforts on Facebook. Among other things, the foundation has learned that, when it comes to social media, "it pays to experiment...to be bold" Writes Painter:

It turns out the risks were actually minimal and manageable -- and the upside was pretty big. Some of us may have had unfounded fears about losing some measure of control of the discussions we were promoting when we moved to Facebook. In our experience, we almost certainly gave away control, but in return we got a glimpse of something much more important and powerful -- energized and empowered collaborators willing to work and share with us toward some important common yet tough, big goals -- like, for instance, improving health care....

Women

On the Minnesota Council on Foundations' Philanthropy Potluck blog, Anne Bauers shares some findings from Women Give 2012, a new study from the Women's Philanthropy Institute at the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University which found that "boomer and older women give 89 percent more to charity than their male counterparts."

And Forbes shares its list of 2012's "Most Powerful Women Philanthropists" -- a list that includes Christine Lagarde of the International Monetary Fund, Helen Clark of the United Nations Development Program, Solina Chau of the Li Ka Shing Foundation, and Risa Lavizzo-Mourey of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

That's it for now. What did we miss? Drop us a line at rnm@foundationcenter.org. And have a great Labor Day weekend!

-- The Editors

Libraries and Latinos: Return to Adams County

(Kathryn Pyle recently marked her fourth anniversary as a PhilanTopic contributor. In her last post, she wrote about the Justice Matters series at Filmfest DC.)

Four years ago, in my first post for PhilanTopic, I described how the Adams County Library system in a rural part of south central Pennsylvania used a modest donation to try out some new ideas and improve its services for the growing Latino population in the area, mainly families and seasonal workers from Mexico.

Since then, thanks to PhilanTopic's broad and inclusive vision of civic life, I've written about a presidential inauguration, a "City of Trees," the first moon landing, transitional justice, a memorial park in Argentina, and -- most frequently -- social issue documentaries and the organizations that support them. Over that time, I've really enjoyed the opportunity the PND team has given me to refine my vision of the nexus of philanthropy and social justice. But today, because this is my thirtieth (!) post for PhilanTopic, I thought it would be interesting to revisit Adams County to see what, if anything, has changed.

I caught up with library director Rob Lesher on his way to the annual library book sale, which was organized by the Friends of the Library at the main branch in Gettysburg; Lesher told me they hoped to raise at least $25,000. That's a lot of used books and a big shot in the arm for any library in an era of government cuts.

"It's been a challenge financially," says Lesher. "But the big news is that this summer we've seen the highest circulation months in our history. Seventy-five thousand items circulated in July, part of a fifteen-year pattern of growth. And 2011 was a record year, with seven hundred and fifty thousand items circulated; we'll equal that this year. Despite the cutbacks, we've managed to expand our services to Latinos. The key has been experimenting with new programs and partnering with community organizations."

As described in my first post about the library, the strategy to reach Latino families included operating a bookmobile with materials in Spanish through the northern end of the county, offering a story-time in Spanish for Latino children, and the acquisition of more Spanish-language magazines. Over time, staff at the library also became aware that the skills and needs of the Latino community were changing.

"In the past, the family member with the strongest English skills, often a child, would be designated to interface with services and programs," says Lesher. "That’s changed, as there's now a whole generation of children who are native English speakers and the parents themselves are more comfortable in English situations. We're seeing more families, not just children, coming to the library to use the computers and take out books. We've discontinued the Spanish-language story-time as the Latino children began attending the English-language story-time program. We still have a small percentage of our materials budget dedicated to Spanish texts, and the bookmobile certainly is still important in reaching the Latino community. But with so many publications now online, there's not as much available and not as much demand for magazines. The library is transitioning as the community matures."

Part of the transition has been the hiring of a Latina, Marisol Rivera, as a library assistant to staff the main desk of the Harbaugh-Thomas library in the town of Biglerville, the largest branch in the northern end of the county and the center of the fruit-growing region where many of the migrant workers in the area and its fruit-processing labor force lives.

"Marisol has been a wonderful addition,” says Lesher. "Her presence has created a welcoming environment and has certainly contributed to the increase in Latino families coming into the library."

Partnerships with community-based organizations also continues to be a key to reaching the region's Latino population. This summer's "Roads to Freedom" program, a treasure hunt created around local history (the Civil War, Native Americans, local industry, quilting and other crafts) that also encourages kids to be physically active as they track clues around the county, is sponsored by Well-Span Health, a local health services corporation. So far, nearly eight hundred booklets with clues and information have been distributed through the library system.

"When we were planning Roads to Freedom," says Lesher, "we consulted with Latino community organizations about also printing the booklets in Spanish. Their recommendation was to include a bilingual welcome but keep the rest of the text in English. This is part of an evolving approach: our target now is an outcome, and to reach the goal we include the community in planning how to best achieve it, but we're finding that as the community matures the needs are different."

An example is the Harbaugh-Thomas library computer center, which I mentioned in my first post as a resource for Latinos seeking to access news from Mexico, e-mail, and other information. In a new program, the library provides the computers and Latino organizations provide the trainers and people, bringing them to the library to learn how to use a computer.

And in a change that might say as much about the community as anything, there is increased interest in bilingual publications, suggesting not only a "maturing" Latino population but also a growing willingness on the part of English speakers to engage with Spanish. "We’re moving more toward that now," says Lesher." It's what people want."

-- Kathryn Pyle

Announcement: Foundation Center Seeks Host Orgs for Cooperating Collections Network

(Kief Schladweiler is coordinator of cooperating collections at the Foundation Center.)

The Foundation Center is looking for host organizations that are ready to join with us to meet the information and training needs of organizations and individuals whose grantseeking needs are not being met.

The center needs your help in identifying appropriate host organizations for our Cooperating Collection network. Cooperating Collections are free funding information centers located in libraries, community foundations, and other nonprofit resource centers that provide a core collection of Foundation Center print and electronic publications and a variety of supplementary materials, training, and services in areas useful to grantseekers.

We are particularly interested in reaching underresourced and underserved populations across the United States and in other locations around the globe that are in need of and can use this information and training to become successful grantseekers.

Watch the video below to learn more about the program and share it with your contacts and colleagues. And if you know of a potential host organization, feel free to use our handy online form to nominate them.

Thanks. With your help, we can continue to ensure free public access to these needed resources in the U.S. and around the world.

-- Kief Schladweiler

Whose Philanthropy Is It Anyway?

(Mary McGrail is director of communications for the Brooklyn-based Independence Community Foundation, a private independent foundation that focuses on community development, education, arts and culture, and economic and workforce development issues in the New York metropolitan area. This is her first post for PhilanTopic.)

Mainstream media coverage of philanthropy often seems confined to eye-popping individual charitable donations, society gala events, "whimsical" bequests, or sponsor plugs on PBS.

Unfortunately, these public narratives don't offer a full picture of the complex, engaged, and ever-changing world of charitable giving. Which is a shame, because more in-depth media coverage of foundations -- and the nonprofit world -- could lead to greater transparency about the inner workings of our sector. It could also lead to greater awareness of what philanthropy routinely accomplishes and even spur more broad-based "grassroots" giving by individuals and communities to projects and organizations they care about. What's more, in this election year, a reasoned, wide-ranging dialogue about the role of philanthropy in generating new approaches to seemingly intractable problems would be a welcome addition to the civic debate. But how can a vigorous conversation occur if the all-too-infrequent philanthropy news story rarely ventures beyond the obvious or sensational?

I'm not saying philanthropy doesn't make headlines now and then. News of Leona Helmsley's bequest in memory of her dog, the aptly named Trouble, is a recent example: According to an article in the NY Times, "[Helmsley's] instructions, specified in a two-page 'mission statement', are that the entire trust, valued at $5 billion to $8 billion and amounting to virtually all her estate, be used for the care and welfare of dogs...."

Reaction was swift, and mostly negative. The "Maltese bequest" became a stand-in for all giving: Writing in the Times, Boston College law professor Ray Madoff explained how Helmsley's bequest "rubs our noses in the tax deduction for charitable gifts and its common vehicle, the perpetual private foundation. Together these provide a mechanism by which American taxpayers subsidize the whims of the rich and fulfill their fantasies of immortality."

But is that really the case? And what about other questions raised by Madoff's piece? Questions like, What should be funded publicly and what privately? When is enough too much? And who decides? More people need to weigh in on these and other issues. The role of philanthropy in society is an important -- even crucial -- topic for public debate, and I'd love to see the day when strongly held opinions about it are as common as opinions about the war in Iraq, sex education in the schools, climate change, or Paris Hilton.

But there are other stories, good stories, out there. My question is: Where is the press?

For example, Professor Madoff might have trouble (no pun intended) referring to the Buy a Book for Macon Library Campaign as something that serves "the whims of the rich." The idea for the innovative campaign was jointly hatched by Independence Community Foundation executive director Marilyn Gelber and Dionne Mack-Harvin, director of the Brooklyn Public Library.

The campaign began with a $50,000 challenge grant to the Macon branch of the Brooklyn Public Library in Bedford-Stuyvesant. ICF matched every dollar raised in the community to purchase the book collection for the century-old library's first African American History Center. Local donations quickly poured in, so Independence raised the "Buy a Book" challenge to $100,000. In all, more than 500 people from the neighborhood -– kids, store owners, writers, readers, church members, activists, parents, artists, and practically anybody who had ever dropped in to the library -- contributed. Over 80 percent of the donations were for less than $150. By the end of the campaign, the residents of Bedford-Stuyvesant had raised over $100,000 for their library, for a total of $200,000, and the library was able to add 15,000 new volumes to its bookshelves. In this instance, at least, people doing good even made the news.

The question is, How do we get the mainstream media to pick up more stories like this? And how do we convince the media that, in these troubled times, man bites dog isn't the only story people care about?

Your thoughts?

-- Mary McGrail

Literacy for a New Generation

(Amit Shah, a long-time publishing executive based in Somerville, Massachusetts, is an avid reader of print newspapers, magazines, books, blogs, and anything else written with verve and wit. This is his first post for PhilanTopic.)

Sunday's front-page article in the NY Times ("Literacy Debate: Online, R U Really Reading?") has already generated more than 180 posts. That there's interest in the topic should come as no surprise. The debate reflects the enormous changes that have occurred over the last ten years with respect to how we access information; what the meaning of "literacy" is in the 21st century; and what yardsticks we use to determine who is and is not literate. If, like me, you've spent a good portion of your career working for textbook publishers, have teenagers of your own, and have derived joy every day of your life from books, magazines, and newspapers, your interest in the topic is especially keen.

It also should come as no surprise that the single biggest issue today in any classroom in the country (and that includes college classrooms) is the inability of too many students to effectively decode text and glean information from age-appropriate materials. Or, as many of the teachers I have worked with put it: "My kids don't read; won't read; can't read.” Indeed, Isabel Beck, a professor in the Department of Instruction and Learning at the University of Pittsburgh and one of the most-respected reading researchers in the nation, has said that most students leave a text without any understanding of the author's intent or ideas.

Understanding and deriving meaning from texts is not only key to the enjoyment of literature -- it is an essential skill for anyone who hopes to succeed in the 21st century knowledge economy. But first you have to get people to read. Not just road signs and short informational pieces but narratives of various complexity.

It's not clear, however, that the digital media tools increasingly used to convey information and ideas -- text messaging, blogs, Twitter, PowerPoint, etc. -- provide the "keys to the kingdom" -- the ability to analyze, synthesize, compare, and evaluate ideas and draw inferences -- in the same way or as effectively as frequent exposure to print texts did for earlier generations. And while state, district, and private school curricula standards have started to specify proficiency levels for various types of informational texts, digital as well as print, the jury is out with respect to whether standards-based curricula can create proficient readers through strict adherence to text-based outcomes (i.e., paper-and-pencil tests).

At the same time, the literacy debate in pedagogical circles has already moved to the next stage: Defining and encouraging "21st century literacies." Or, as Sara Kajder, assistant professor at Virginia Polytechnic Institute, puts it: "[We need to expand] the technology toolset students use as readers and writers....We must teach them how to synthesize a range of texts that appear on a screen at lightning speed and communicate to authentic, wired, global audiences with the explosion of new tools, modes, and media now made readily accessible by Web 2.0."

The fact that standard secondary school literature anthologies contain graphic novel selections of a classic such as Beowulf simply underscores what many of us already knew: There are many ways to teach students about archetypes and epic heroes. Whether they are "writing" via digital storytelling formats, creating summaries via electronic portfolios, comparing hip-hop lyrics with poems by Langston Hughes, today's readers are indeed reading. And that gets to the key issue of literacy in the 21st century: Using any and every tool at hand to get students to engage with literature and complex texts. We need to do more of it.

-- Amit Shah

From Seeds to Saplings

(Kathryn Pyle was senior representative for Central America/Mexico at the Inter-American Foundation; executive director of the Samuel S. Fels Fund; and co-founder of Delaware Valley Grantmakers. Currently, she is producing a documentary film about the post-conflict period in El Salvador. In the post below, her first for PhilanTopic, she describes how a small donation expanded library services to Latinos in a rural Pennsylvania county.)

I spent several teenage summers in the 1960s picking fruit alongside migrant crews from Puerto Rico; my family lived in the fruit growing region north of Gettysburg, in Adams County, Pennsylvania. When the apple harvest was over in the fall, the Puerto Ricans left.

Around 1980, Mexican workers began to make up the crews, and the Mexicans stayed. The population of Adams County is now about five percent Latino; that’s 5,000 people, with several hundred migrant workers temporarily bumping up that number during fruit season.

The county economy is agriculture-based, with 20,000 acres of fruit orchards and several fruit processing plants providing seasonal and year round jobs. Most of the Latino laborers are Mexican; they tend to come from poor rural areas, and have few years of schooling.

I left Adams County many years ago but was aware of the changing demographics. As a grantmaker with experience in rural Mexico, I could imagine the needs in this new community and wondered how the county might assist their educational and cultural integration.

When my parents passed away, my family decided to honor their involvement with the Adams County Library by offering a $5,000 contribution, in 2002, as seed money to determine how the library could best serve the Latino community. The library had a small section of books in Spanish, but agreed they could be doing more. The staff was interested and now had a small pot for research and experimentation.

A librarian was hired to evaluate the programs and materials, consult with local Latino groups, and make recommendations to improve services; her report formed the basis for the library’s current work and their plans for the future.

The most important result was new partnerships with Latino organizations that extend library services and provide outreach paths. The library now has a booth at the annual "Día de los Niños" organized by Generación Diez, which provides services to at-risk youth. Library staff conduct "story hours" throughout the year at the Lincoln Intermediate Unit, which provides supplemental education for children of migrant farm workers and ESL classes for adults. The Latino Services Task Force has helped the library connect with talented youth who might become part time employees; the library has found it can't yet compete for bicultural permanent staff and this would be a good temporary solution.

The library also changed its geographic focus. The central library is in Gettysburg, where Latinos seldom come except for the Sunday mass in Spanish. But there are seven branch libraries located in small towns, four of them in the northern Adams County fruit-growing region where most Latinos live, and there's a bookmobile that goes everywhere else. The library has shifted the materials and programs to where the population lives and the bookmobile now stops regularly at the Migrant Center children's program and carries Spanish literature on its northern Adams County route.

The collection was revised as well. The staff recognized that their "Spanish collection" -- translations of English novels -- didn't appeal to the target users. Now there are more ESL materials, CDs of contemporary Mexican singers, and Spanish-language religious books, popular magazines, and children's books.

Translation of library materials into Spanish seemed like a good idea and was tried, but the brochures were not picked up. Outreach librarian Virginia Green prefers to post the occasional Spanish-language notice of special events at the branch libraries in the local grocery stores catering to Mexican families. The library Web site has a link to ESL classes offered by local service groups and might invest in a Spanish version of their own site in the future. Green is now organizing a library task force on Latino outreach, composed of librarians and community leaders, to set priorities.

In the new Harbaugh-Thomas branch, in Biglerville, the largest branch in northern Adams County, librarian Jessica Laganosky welcomes twenty-five regulars who use the library weekly: the number is growing by word of mouth as kids bring their parents and help them use the computers. Lagonosky attended a Gates Foundation state- wide workshop for librarians on increasing services to Latinos; she came away with lots of ideas. She wants to attract Latino groups to the library'’s meeting spaces and add more bilingual and beginning-level Spanish books.

Five years after the seed money was given, new programs are in place and in the works. Library director Rob Lesher sees it as a process of finding the right partners and investing resources strategically. Still to come: bilingual staff and more programs for adults.

A small, personal seed-grant/donation results in expanded library services to an underserved Latino community. How can other donors and foundations find organizations that can help them nurture and grow a vision? We'd love to hear your thoughts.

-- Kathryn Smith Pyle