Foundation Annual Reports

CHARLES A. DANA FOUNDATION
745 Fifth Avenue, Suite 700
New York 10151
(212) 223-4040
World-Wide Web: http://www.dana.org
Period covered: Year ending December 31, 1997.

Purpose and areas of support:

The foundation was created in 1950 by Charles A. Dana, a New York State legislator and industrialist. The two major program areas in which it makes grants are health and education. In 1997, it appropriated $11,253,264 as follows: health programs received $8,165,120; education, $2,310,450; the Dana Awards Program, $465,184; and cultural and civic programs, $312,510.

Health-related grants focus on collaborative research on brain diseases and disorders by consortia of scientists. The foundation currently supports such consortia at medical centers that study memory loss in elderly people, the genetic basis of manic-depressive illness, language-based learning disorders, therapies for H.I.V.- related dementia, and neuroimaging training.

The foundation also supports the Dana Clinical Hypotheses Program in Neuroscience Research, through which six competitive grants of $100,000 each were made to enable researchers to test experimental applications of brain-imaging technologies. This year the program will expand to examine hypotheses on the relationship of the brain to cancer, heart disease, and strokes.

The Dana Alliance for Brain Initiatives, which is devoted to public education on neuroscience research, received a new award of $2,935,220. The Dana Press set up a program with John Wiley & Sons to publish books about the brain and brain research; the first book, The Longevity Strategy: How to Live to 100 Using the Brain-Body Connection, reached bookstores early this year.

The foundation’s education program supports the dissemination of strategies identified through the Dana Awards for Pioneering Achievements in Education. The focus is on strengthening pre-collegiate education in U.S. public schools, with an emphasis on early-childhood education.

Application procedure: Initial inquiries should be in the form of a two-page letter that describes the following: the project that is proposed and the need it would meet; the project’s congruence with the foundation’s interests in health or education; the means to be used to achieve the project’s goals; the applicant institution’s capability to implement the project; the qualifications of the proposed director of the project; and the estimated cost and proposed methods of financing the project, including the institution’s intended contribution. Proposals submitted by fax will not be accepted, and supporting materials should not be submitted until they are requested. If the foundation determines that an inquiry fits its interests, a full proposal will be requested, to be accompanied by documents establishing the applicant organization’s tax-exempt status under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code.

Key officials: David Mahoney, chief executive officer and chairman of the Board of Directors; Barbara E. Gill, vice-president for public affairs and executive director of the Dana Alliance for Brain Initiatives; Burton M. Mirsky, vice-president for finance; Jane Nevins, vice-president and editor in chief of the Dana Press.

ANDREW W. MELLON FOUNDATION
140 East 62nd Street
New York 10021
(212) 838-8400
World-Wide Web: http://www.mellon.org
Period covered: Year ending December 31, 1997.

Purpose and areas of support:

The foundation was formed in 1969 through the consolidation of the Avalon Foundation, established in 1940 by Ailsa Mellon Bruce, daughter of Andrew W. Mellon, and the Old Dominion Foundation, established in 1941 by her brother, Paul Mellon.

In 1997, grants totaling $119.8-million were appropriated in six program areas: higher education and scholarship, which received $65.2-million; conservation and the environment, $15.0-million; public affairs, $13.5-million; population, $10.2-million; performing arts, $10.1-million; and museums and art conservation, $5.8-million.

Higher-education and scholarship grants emphasized postdoctoral humanities research, liberal-arts colleges, minority education, and the use of electronic technology to teach foreign languages and other subjects and to disseminate scholarly research.

The largest single allocation was a $5-million grant to the American Council of Learned Societies, in New York, for its five-year campaign to double the amount of fellowship support that it provides annually to humanities scholars and to double its fellowship endowment.

Other grants included $1.8-million to the Appalachian College Association, in Berea, Ky., to improve student and faculty access to electronic networks and data bases at selected Appalachian colleges.

The foundation increased its support for environmental projects, which emphasized ecological research and training and projects on coastal, soil, plant, and tropical ecology.

Public-affairs grants focused on Central and Eastern Europe, South Africa, minority participation in international affairs, technology and libraries, literacy, and policies that affect immigrants and refugees. Awards included $275,000 to the Russell Sage Foundation, in New York, for a study on the economic and social assimilation of second-generation immigrants.

The foundation’s former arts program has been divided into two components: the performing arts, and museums and art conservation. Within those areas, a new series of forums was created to discuss the status of, and prospects for, U.S. symphony orchestras, and a new program on the conservation of photographs was established.

Application procedure: Applications are reviewed throughout the year, and no special forms are required. In most cases, a short letter describing the nature and amount of the request and the justification for it — along with evidence of tax-exempt designation from the I.R.S. and any supplementary exhibits the applicant may wish to include — is sufficient to permit consideration by staff members. Only rarely is a grant made in response to an unsolicited proposal outside defined areas of interest, and prospective applicants are encouraged to explore their ideas informally with foundation staff members — preferably in writing — before submitting formal proposals. The foundation does not make grants to individuals or to organizations that are primarily local.

Key officials: William G. Bowen, president; T. Dennis Sullivan, financial vice-president; Harriet Zuckerman, vice-president; Mary Patterson McPherson, senior program officer; Stephanie Bell-Rose, Jacqueline Looney, Carolyn Makinson, William Robertson IV, and Catherine Wichterman, program officers; Hanna H. Gray, chairman of the Board of Trustees.

EUGENE AND AGNES E. MEYER FOUNDATION
1400 16th Street, N.W., Suite 360
Washington 20036
> (202) 483-8294
Period covered: Two years ending December 31, 1997.

Purpose and areas of support:

The foundation was endowed in 1944 by Eugene Meyer, the first president of the World Bank and former publisher of The Washington Post, and his wife, Agnes, a journalist and author.

In 1997, it allocated 224 grants in six program areas: community service, which received 40 per cent of grant dollars; neighborhood development and housing, 24 per cent; health and mental health, 13 per cent; education, 10 per cent; the arts and humanities, 8 per cent; and law and justice, 5 per cent.

Grant recipients must be located in and must serve the metropolitan Washington area, which the foundation defines as the District of Columbia; Maryland’s Calvert, Charles, Montgomery, Prince George’s, and St. Mary’s Counties; and Virginia’s Arlington, Fairfax, Loudoun, Prince William, and Stafford Counties and the cities of Alexandria, Falls Church, Manassas, and Manassas Park.

In partnership with the Ford Foundation and seven additional grant makers, the foundation created the Initiative to Strengthen Neighborhood Inter-Group Assets, which encourages people of differing ethnic and racial groups to work together to improve their neighborhoods. Communities involved in the program include the District of Columbia’s Columbia Heights and Mount Pleasant neighborhoods and northern Virginia’s South Arlington neighborhood.

Grants in other program areas included $21,772 to the Korean Community Services Center, in Washington, to provide citizenship, health-care, employment, and literacy services.

Application procedure: Interested applicants should submit a pre-proposal letter of inquiry one month before the following proposal deadlines: October 1 to be considered at the February board meeting, February 1 for the June meeting, and June 1 for the October meeting. Letters should be no more than two pages in length and should include a summary of the proposal; an explanation of the proposal’s relationship to the organization’s primary mission and activities; the amount of financial support being sought, the total proposed budget, and financial commitments to date; the organization’s annual operating budget for the most recent fiscal year; and contact information.

Key officials: Julie L. Rogers, president; Cynthia D. Robbins, senior program officer; Katherine T. Freshley and Benita Kornegay-Henry, program officers; David W. Rutstein, chair of the Board of Directors.