Philanthropic practice

"We have to stop being afraid of the critique,” Joe Scantlebury, CEO of Living Cities says in the Chronical of Philanthropy. “We don’t improve in silence.”

Following an extensive national search, United States Artists’ (USA) Board of Trustees announced this month the appointment of Judilee Reed as its new President and CEO.

Angelique Power, president and CEO of the Detroit-based Skillman Foundation, speaks with eJewishPhilanthropy on the power — and necessity — of centering trust within grantmaking. "What’s complicated about philanthropy is that money and power are often synonymous," Power says, "And so while the sector is directed at helping, being the arbiter of how capital moves makes you — in some ways, it jeopardizes trust, just in that act right there. It creates this uneven scenario where people are coming to you asking for funding."

Victoria Foundation announced yesterday that Sharnita C. Johnson will serve as the Foundation’s Vice President of Strategy, Impact and Communications. In this new position, Johnson will provide oversight and management of all programmatic activities and ensure alignment with the Foundation goals and values.

Grantmakers for Effective Organizations recently released a publication that, as the website explains, "builds on the principles outlined in Strengthening Nonprofit Capacity and will take a critical look at the ways in which capacity-building practices can be grounded in approaches that acknowledge and center racial equity."

Brookings recently published a piece by Paula Arce-Trigatti, director of the National Network of Education Research-Practice Partnerships, reflecting on various aspects of partnership work, lessons on defining research-practice partnerships, and how to know whether partnership work is making a positive impact.

As part of The Redford Center's investments in storytelling strategies that respond to the urgency of today’s crises, the center introduced a new category of impact grants as part of their expanded grantmaking strategy.

A new toolkit, "The Arts Organizations at a Crossroads Toolkit: Managing transitions and preserving assets," published by the National Coalition for Arts’ Preparedness and Emergency Response (NCAPER), seeks to guide arts leaders through significant transitions they are likely to face during their organization’s life: structural shifts, loss of key staff/leadership, and creation of artistic and physical assets which deserve preserving.

This is part two of a two-part series on individual artist support written by Marc Zegans and published by GIA. In follow-up to his GIA Reader article from 2017, Zegans offers his perspective on the cycle of creative growth that artists experience throughout their careers and opportunities for grantmakers to re-examine how they develop and adjust their practices to meet nonlinear needs.

This is the first part of a two-part series on individual artist support written by Marc Zegans and published by GIA. Following-up to his GIA Reader article from 2017, Zegans offers his perspective on the cycle of creative growth that artists experience throughout their careers, and opportunities for grantmakers to re-examine how they develop and adjust their practices to meet nonlinear needs.