February 17, 2016 | Read Time: 2 minutes
Members of a partnership of five foundations called NetGain steered more than $18 million in the program’s first year to nonprofits that work to make the Internet more accessible and increase its potential as a tool for social justice.
The bulk of the support came in separate grants from the group’s members: the Ford, Knight, MacArthur, Mozilla, and Open Society foundations. The groups also combined to make five grants of $250,000 each to the Technology Science Research Network at Harvard University, Code for America, the Media Democracy Fund, the New America Foundation’s Open Technology Institute, and an executive education effort that will support existing leadership and technology training programs.
The partnership has identified several pressing needs in the field of public interest technology, which it defines as increasing the number of people who use technology to make the world more fair and improve civil society and government. They include the creation of a “pipeline” of tech experts working for social justice, increasing digital literacy among nonprofits, and boosting connectivity among minorities and residents of isolated communities.
Tech Experts Consulted
In a report released today, the group examined ways to attract and develop talented technology leaders with an interest in social causes. NetGain gleaned suggestions for how donors should respond to those needs from more than 60 technology experts from nonprofits, academe, philanthropy, and government.
Possible solutions included the development of “culturally relevant” K-12 computer science classes for low-income and minority students, support of online learning programs, and the creation of technology “boot camps” to train nonprofit leaders in technology and bring computer experts up to speed on nonprofit issues.
“Philanthropy has a responsibility to ensure that technology makes the world more equal,” said Darren Walker, president of the Ford Foundation, in a statement. “For many of society’s more disenfranchised, their relationship with technology is a virtual extension of their exclusion.”
NetGain plans to announce its next area of study later this year.
