Foundation Annual Reports

MINNEAPOLIS FOUNDATION

800 IDS Center
80 South Eighth Street
Minneapolis, Minn. 55402
(612) 672-3878
http://www.minneapolisfoundation.org

Period covered: Year ending March 31, 2004.

Purpose and areas of support: Established in 1915, this community foundation is the oldest such fund in Minnesota. It makes grants that primarily benefit residents of Minnesota, with an emphasis on those who live in the Minneapolis-St. Paul region. The foundation comprises more than 700 unrestricted, donor-advised, field-of-interest, scholarship, and other types of funds. During the foundation’s 2003-4 fiscal year, 64 individuals and families created new funds, of which 44 were donor-advised funds. In addition, 13 individuals joined Community Builders, a program for donors who have included the foundation in their estate plans, and there are now 203 individuals participating in the program.

The foundation provides two ways in which Minnesota nonprofit organizations can apply for grants: the Community Grants program, which provides support through the unrestricted funds of the foundation and its supporting organizations, and the Connections Grants program, which allows groups to request project-specific funds designated by individual donors.

In 2003-4, discretionary grants totaling $4,600,800 were allocated through the Community Grants program, down from $6,776,320 the previous fiscal year. The program primarily supports efforts designed to bring about lasting change in systems and policies that affect disadvantaged Minnesotans, with an emphasis on affordable housing, economic opportunities, educational achievement, and the health and well-being of children, youths, and families.

Housing and economic-development grants stress strategies designed to expand safe, low-cost housing and to increase entrepreneurship and other opportunities for economic advancement in low-income Minnesota communities. For example, Minnesota Acorn, in St. Paul, received $50,000 for its Foreclosure Rescue Scam Prevention and Solution Project, and the Neighborhood Development Center, also in St. Paul, received $90,000 to provide technical assistance to Latino entrepreneurs and to expand a financing program for Muslim entrepreneurs that meets the requirements of Islamic law.

Education grants emphasize systemic efforts to guarantee high-quality educations for all children in Minnesota and to strengthen public schools. One aspect of the foundation’s work in this area is Destination 2010, a student-achievement and scholarship program for selected students attending public schools in Minneapolis and St. Paul. Nearly 300 students participate in the program, which seeks to help them graduate from high school on schedule in 2010, at which time each will receive a scholarship of $5,000 or $10,000.

Allocations to benefit children, youths, and families included $25,000 to Rural Enrichment and Counseling Headquarters, in Hawley, for a program to demonstrate “best practices” for providing human services in rural communities, and $80,000 to the Battered Women’s Legal Advocacy Project, in Minneapolis, to design and adopt a strategy that coordinates regional domestic-violence, homelessness, and housing systems.

Also in 2003-4, the foundation was the lead sponsor for Minneapolis Mosaic, a summer-long festival that showcases artistic and cultural diversity.

Application procedure: Potential applicants should consult the foundation’s grant guidelines, entitled “Broader Reach,” which are available on the foundation’s Web site or may be obtained by calling (612) 672-3861. The foundation also conducts periodic informational meetings for grant seekers.

Key officials: Emmett D. Carson, president and chief executive officer; Stuart Appelbaum, vice president, development; Desiree Heller, vice president, philanthropic consulting services; Bruce Hutchins, vice president, finance and administration; Karen Kelley-Ariwoola, vice president, community philanthropy; Christelle Langer, vice president, marketing and communications; Marigrace Deters, associate vice president, community philanthropy; Eric Anderson, Valerie Lee, Ruth Parriott, and Joanne Walz, community-philanthropy officers; Matt Karl, grants administrator; Richard McFarland, chair of the Board of Trustees.

ALFRED P. SLOAN FOUNDATION

630 Fifth Avenue, Suite 2550
New York, N.Y. 10111
(212) 649-1649
http://www.sloan.org

Period covered: Year ending December 31, 2003.

Purpose and areas of support: The foundation was established in 1934 by Alfred Pritchard Sloan Jr., who served as president of the General Motors Corporation from 1923-46, and as chairman of its board from 1937-1956. Mr. Sloan died in 1966.

Grant making centers on five programs: science and technology, standard of living and economic performance, education and careers in science and technology, selected national issues, and civic affairs.

In 2003, the fund awarded Sloan Research Fellowships totaling $4,680,000 to 117 scholars at 49 institutions. The scholars, who each received $40,000 over two years, were nominated for their work in chemistry, computational and evolutionary molecular biology, computer science, economics, mathematics, neuroscience, and physics.

The foundation also allocates grants for research in areas it considers to be of scientific significance but that lack major government or other support. Grant making focuses on six areas: astrophysics, computational molecular biology, “limits to knowledge,” marine science, molecular evolution, and theoretical neurobiology. Projects include the Sloan Sky Survey, which seeks to “understand the evolution and structure of the universe by providing the largest uniform, detailed archive of objects in the skies that has ever existed,” and a comprehensive census of the diversity, distribution, and abundance of marine life.

The program on standard of living and economic performance seeks to analyze the factors that influence American economic progress and the U.S. standard of living. It awards grants in five main areas: business organizations, higher education as an industry, industry studies, performance assessments of municipal governments, and studies of the workplace, work force, and working families. Allocations included $42,000 to Brandeis University, in Waltham, Mass., to study parental stress that stems from long, inflexible work hours.

The foundation’s program on education and careers in science and technology emphasizes educating and retaining women and underrepresented minorities in those fields; expanding the numbers of American Indians, blacks, and Latinos who earn doctorates in engineering, mathematics, and the natural sciences; enhancing online and other innovative approaches to learning outside the classroom; retaining students at the graduate level; and improving public understanding of science and technology issues.

The program on national issues currently focuses on reducing threats from bioterrorism and on improving the ways in which federal economic and other statistics are collected, analyzed, and used.

The civic-affairs program makes a limited number of grants in New York City, where the foundation is based.

Application procedure: The foundation has no deadlines or standard application forms. It generally makes grants to organizations that are classified as tax-exempt under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code. Applicants are advised to send a brief letter of inquiry, rather than a fully developed proposal, as a first step. Grants of $45,000 or less are made throughout the year by officers of the foundation, whereas grants of more than $45,000 are made by the board, which meets quarterly. Additional information about the foundation’s program and grant-making guidelines is available on its Web site.

Key officials: Ralph E. Gomory, president; William B. Petersen, vice president and chief investment officer; June M. Yearwood, vice president and secretary; Christopher T. Sia, treasurer and chief technology officer; Harold T. Shapiro, chairman of the Board of Trustees.

Program directors: Jesse H. Ausubel, Kathleen E. Christensen, Ted Greenwood, A. Frank Mayadas, Paula J. Olsiewski, Gail M. Pesyna, Michael S. Teitelbaum, and Doron Weber.

SURDNA FOUNDATION

330 Madison Avenue, 30th Floor
New York, N.Y. 10017
(212) 557-0010
http://www.surdna.org

Period covered: Year ending June 30, 2004.

Purpose and areas of support: The Surdna Foundation was created in 1917 by John Emory Andrus (1841-1934), a New York businessman, investor, and politician. The foundation’s grant making initially focused on support for orphaned children — Mr. Andrus’s wife had been orphaned as a child — and later on the elderly and on emotionally disturbed children. In 1989, the third and fourth generations of the Andrus family to serve on the foundation’s board created programs on community revitalization and the environment. These were supplemented in 1994 by programs on the arts and effective citizenry and in 1997 by the Nonprofit Sector Support Program.

During the 2004 fiscal year, the foundation authorized grants totaling $25,619,283 in the following categories: the environment program received $7,000,000; community revitalization, $4,975,000; nonprofit-sector support, $4,295,000; effective citizenry, $3,696,000; the arts, $2,832,800; the Andrus Family Fund, $1,818,000; and miscellaneous, $1,002,483.

The program on the environment makes grants to American organizations and emphasizes four areas: biological diversity and the human communities that depend on it; “realigning human and natural systems”; transportation and the sustainable use of urban and suburban lands; and renewable energy sources and energy efficiency. Biological-diversity grants, for example, stress the relationship between the degradation and loss of habitat and species from overfishing, land development, and other factors, and the forestry, fishing, and other communities that are dependent upon those resources for their livelihood.

The community-revitalization program aims to “enhance the quality of life in urban places, increase their ability to attract and retain a diversity of residents and employers, and insure that urban policies and development promote social equity.” To help achieve this, the foundation stresses differing approaches in what it deems “growing cities” and “declining cities.” In all cities, however, the foundation works to improve the quality and quantity of child care and child-care providers, to support efforts that can be duplicated elsewhere, and to seek out projects that embrace “smart growth” principles and contribute to compact, pedestrian-friendly neighborhoods.

The nonprofit-sector program focuses on strengthening the effectiveness of nonprofit institutions as a whole and on promoting expanded, more effective philanthropy. For example, the Maryland Association of Nonprofit Organizations, in Baltimore, received a two-year, $100,000 grant for its Standards for Excellence project, which details ethical practices and policies that nonprofit groups should adhere to, and the Big Sky Institute for the Advancement of Nonprofits, in Helena, Mont., received $15,000 for the Philanthropic Divide Project, a research effort intended to show that many of the country’s poorest states have very limited nonprofit and philanthropic resources.

Application procedure: Potential applicants should send a letter of inquiry, rather than a full proposal, as a first step. The foundation strongly recommends that applicants submit letters of inquiry online. Upon receipt of the letter of inquiry, the foundation will issue notification of its 90-day consideration period. Although there are no deadlines for letters of inquiry, the board meets three times annually — in February, May, and September — to consider grants, and letters should be timed to allow at least three months for staff review. Additional information, including detailed guidelines on submitting a letter of inquiry, is available on the foundation’s Web site.

Key officials: Edward Skloot, executive director; Marc de Venoge, chief financial and administrative officer; Hooper L. Brooks, program director for environment; Ellen B. Rudolph, program director for arts; Robert Sherman, program director for effective citizenry; Vincent Stehle, program officer for nonprofit-sector initiative; Jonathan Goldberg, grants administrator and information specialist; Elizabeth H. Andrus, chairperson of the Board of Directors; John E. Andrus III, chairman emeritus.