Forum Bits
The newsletter of the regional association network
January 16, 2015
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| Forum Resource Spotlight |
Bromelkamp Discount
Through a special arrangement with Bromelkamp Company, RAs can now offer your members a 5% discount on Bromelkamp Company's grants management products, Akoya.net and Pearl.
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| Forum Office Contacts |
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Be Sure to Read
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The Center for Disaster Philanthropy and Foundation Center partnered to conduct the most comprehensive data collection and analysis effort to date on disaster-focused charitable giving.
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| Network Hires | |
Jacob Akins joined Arizona Grantmakers Forum as Member Services and Communications Associate.
Ann Saxton joined Philanthropy Northwest as Vice President.
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| Newsletter Archive | |
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Forum Board Appoints Mary O'Neill Interim Director
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 The Forum's Board of Director is pleased to announce that it has appointed Mary O'Neill, the Forum's Director of Programs, as Interim Director.
Mary has been with the Forum serving in a number of capacities for nearly ten years. As Director of Programs, she oversees all of the Forum's member programming and leads the development of the Forum's collaborative partnerships with colleagues across the field. During her tenure, Mary has led several high profile initiatives for the Forum, including work on grantmaker education, accountability and effectiveness, Essential Skills and Strategies for New Grantmakers, Foundations on the Hill, the Forum's Annual Conference, and many other projects.
Read the full announcement
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Don't Miss Out on Our 2014 Recaps
|  The Forum Network had a great 2014! We set a record for attendance at our annual conference, increased both the number and satisfaction ratings of our member programming, developed a trategic partnership with the Foundation Center, launched 15+ web sites and Salesforce instances (including our own), and moved offices. Check out the following recaps of the year for more information: |
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Submit Your Best Program of 2014 to the Grantmaker Education Programming Directory
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 As we begin a new year, we hope you'll take a few minutes to think back to your own RA's best program in 2014 and share it with your fellow RAs through the Grantmaker Education Programming Directory. Submitting is easy through our web form.
Recent submissions include:
- Engaging the Next Generation of Family Philanthropists- a small group discussion for family foundations about both the promise and the challenges of philanthropy that crosses multiple family generations and how families can effectively navigate these transitions. Submitted by Rebekah Seder, Washington Regional Association of Grantmakers
- Storytelling for Social Change- a workshop with Paul VanDeCarr of Working Narratives about how both grantmakers and grantees can harness the power of stories to bring about change on entrenched problems. Submitted by Rebekah Seder, Washington Regional Association of Grantmakers
- 10 Things You Didn't Know You Could Do With Your (Family) Foundation- a workshop with Andrew Schulz, Arabella Advisors, to better understand the tools available to foundations from grants to non-charities, direct charitable activities, scholarships, and international grants, to program-related investments (PRIs), mission-related investments (MRIs), and even advocacy and policy engagement. Submitted by Rebekah Seder, Washington Regional Association of Grantmakers
Last fall the Forum launched the Grantmaker Education Programming Directory. It's been called "fantastic," "amazing, and "user-friendly" by RA staff members. If you haven't had a chance to do so already, check it out here.
If you have any questions about the directory, please feel free to contact Dan Brady.
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 Dollars and Sense: Capital Campaign Report
The Gateway Center for Giving publishes this annual capital and endowment campaign report to inform grantmakers, nonprofits, and other community leaders about resources being allocated toward restricted funding activities in the St. Louis region. The Capital Campaign Report is the only report in the region that captures the trends and data about capital campaigns and restricted endowments that are being considered, currently underway, and recently closed.
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Introducing the "Get on the Map" Toolkit
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The "Get on the Map" campaign, a partnership of the Forum Network and Foundation Center, is a new data-sharing initiative dedicated to boosting the quality and availability of fresh, detailed grantmaking data across the Forum Network.
Through this partnership, regional associations can run their own peer-led campaigns to recruit members to share grants data using Foundation Center's eReporting Standard. The data will then be centralized at Foundation Center and made freely accessible to all members in the region through the Foundation Maps platform- a highly interactive and searchable mapping tool.
Foundation Maps will provide complete, up-to-date answers to questions like:
- Who else is funding a particular issue in our region?
- What organizations are tackling that issue?
- Where are the funding gaps?
- Who may be natural collaborators?
And much more...
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Philanthropy New York's PhilanthroPost Now Daily
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Philanthropy New York is now offering an option for their readers to receive the latest philanthropy news daily. Email readers can continue to choose the weekly or bi-monthly options as well. The daily version provides member news, Opinions & Insights, sector news, PNY news, On the Move and Jobs in Philanthropy items posted in the previous 24 hours. Check out Philanthropy New York's news site here.
Washington Regional Association of Grantmakers also produces a popular daily compilation of the latest news about the Greater Washington region, philanthropy, and their members, The Daily WRAG.
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Call for Foundation Nominations: 2015 NCRP Impact Awards
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 From our colleagues at the National Council for Responsive Philanthropy. Please consider sharing with your own networks.
The National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy invites you to nominate up to 10 foundations that demonstrate exemplary grantmaking, leadership and commitment to diversity, inclusion and equity for the 2015 NCRP Impact Awards.
Now in its third year, the 2015 NCRP Impact Awards will honor four foundations in four categories: Large Private Foundation, Small/Midsize Foundation, Corporate Foundation and Grantmaking Public Charity. The awardees and their impactful work will be celebrated at a reception on Tuesday, May 19, during the Center for Effective Philanthropy's Conference in San Francisco.
Nominations are open to all and must be submitted by February 6, 2015.
Find out more about the nomination process
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Register for Upcoming Programming
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 Kids Count, Racial Equity and the Role of Foundations (Grantmakers Welcome)
Thursday, January 22, 2-3 pm ET
Join a brief webinar to discuss the Annie E. Casey Foundation's Kids Count policy report, Race for Results: Building a Path to Opportunity for All Children. In the report, the foundation explores the intersection of kids, race, and opportunity. The report also features the new Race for Results Index, which compares how children are progressing on key milestones across racial and ethnic groups at the national and state levels and offers policy recommendations. In addition to hearing about the above report, we will hear from regional association staff on how they are utilizing this information and working with funders on this issue.
Speakers: Elisabeth Hyleck, Association of Baltimore Area Grantmakers; Laura Speer, Annie E. Casey Foundation and Nonet Sykes, Annie E. Casey Foundation
Fund the People! Strengthen Your Region's Social Sector: Educate Funders about Investing in Nonprofit Talent
Tuesday, February 17, 2-3 pm ET
It's widely accepted that people, not programs, drive the performance and impact of nonprofits. Yet Foundation Center data shows that only 1% of grant dollars have gone toward leadership or staff development over the past 20 years. A new initiative supported by the Packard, Kresge, and Annie E. Casey foundations and American Express Philanthropy, Talent Philanthropy Project, aims to increase funding for people from 1% to 10% by 2025. Talent Philanthropy have begun this work by producing research, ideas, practical tools and events that are making "talent philanthropy" a new norm across in the funding and nonprofit community.
Now, in partnership with the Forum, Talent Philanthropy seeks to offer more Regional Associations a unique value proposition by enabling you to deliver cutting-edge new content, interesting educational events, and practical tools to your members on this essential but rarely addressed issue. They have presented at Council of Michigan Foundations, Philanthropy Southwest and Northern California Grantmakers in the past.
Join Talent Philanthropy for an interactive webinar to learn about the latest data on the nonprofit workforce, the benefits of talent-focused grantmaking from the funders' perspective, and practical new resources that they will produce in 2015.
Talent Philanthropy is founded and led by President and CEO Rusty Stahl, who previously led the funder network Emerging Practitioners in Philanthropy (EPIP). Experienced philanthropy consultants including Jessica Bearman, Mark Sedway and Jara Dean-Coffey are working on the project team as well.
Register online to participate |
Resources from Recent Programming
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 Engaging Donors of Commercial FundsDecember 9
The Forum hosted a conference call for RAs to discuss strategy ideas to engage donors to the commercial funds like Fidelity, Vanguard, etc.
Building Momentum for Data Standards to Tell Philanthropy's Full Story
December 10
The final webinar in a four-part series with the D5 Coalition to learn how regional associations and their members are using data conversations and tools to spark efforts to advance diversity, equity, and inclusion in philanthropy, and to strengthen their grantmaking and impacts in communities.
Learn About The Strategic Community Engagement Toolkit + Coaching
December 15
The Forum hosted a webinar for RAs to hear more about Changing Our World's 15-week guided strategic planning process for community engagement to help companies develop thoughtful strategies that leverage company assets to benefit the community. Through a special partnership, RA members can receive a 20% discount when they sign-up for the Toolkit + Coaching and a portion of members' toolkit fees will go back to their respective regional associations.
Public Policy Round Robin
January 13
The Forum hosts a monthly round robin call for RAs to exchange information on policy work, both legislative and administrative. This month included a discussion on Indiana Philanthropy Alliance's regional legislative luncheons.
January 15
The Forum hosted a webinar for RAs and members to learn more about Changing Our World's guided strategic planning process for community engagement to help companies develop thoughtful strategies that leverage corporate assets to the benefit the community and the discount available.
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Forum Network in the News
|  Recent media mentions of regional associations around the country:
Minnesota Council on Foundations: MN Next: Thinking differently about diversity (interview with Alfonso Wenker, Director of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion) and East Sider wins philanthropy fellowship (profiles recent recipient of MCF's Ron McKinley Philanthropy Fellowship)
Philanthropy New York: Finding the Cash for Big Arts Projects (quotes Michael Hamill Remaley, Senior Vice President for Public Policy and Communications)
Washington Regional Association of Grantmakers: A Fresh Take on CSR Professional Development (guest post by Katy Moore, Director of Corporate Strategy)
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Highlights from RA Blogging
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Upcoming Events
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FOR REGIONAL ASSOCIATIONS
Tuesday, February 10, 2-3 pm ET: Policy Round Robin Call. Conference Call.
Tuesday February 17, 2-3 pm ET: Fund the People! Strengthen Your Region's Social Sector: Educate Funders about Investing in Nonprofit Talent. Webinar.
July 21-23, 2015: Forum Annual Conference. Baltimore, MD. Save the Date!
March 18-19, 2015: Foundations on the Hill. Washington, DC. Forum of Regional Associations of Grantmakers in partnership with the Council on Foundations.
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Forum Office Contacts
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 Dan Brady, Communications Manager (202-521-9161)
- Contact Dan with questions about the Knowledgebase, content management, listservs, social networking, and online content strategy.
Courtney Moore, Member Services and Operations Manager (202-888-7428)
- Contact Courtney for general information about Forum membership and services, regional association contact information, conference and teleconference logistics, member surveys, and orientation for new regional association staff. Courtney is also the main contact for regional association staff updates.
- Contact Mary with questions about grantmaker education, public policy, organizational partnerships, and special projects such as the Essential Skills and Strategies for New Grantmakers.
Val Rozansky, Director of Knowledge Services (202-888-7430)
- Contact Val with questions about the Forum's Knowledge Management Initiative, KM system partnerships, membership databases, and all issues relating to technology and electronic communications.
- Contact Erin with questions about the Forum's public policy work including protecting the charitable deduction, building capacity of regional associations to engage in policy, and the PolicyWorks for Philanthropy initiative.
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Courtney Moore, Member Services and Operations Manager  Forum of Regional Associations of Grantmakers |
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